Welcome to Farming With Nature
Farming with Nature (FwN) is an EIP funded environmental programme that provides a template to quantify and qualify space for nature on Irish farmland. It supplies an app and a web platform for farmers, ecologists and the public to support the measurement and management of biodiversity. This template can work for back gardens and large scale farming enterprises alike.
Data gathered is verified by an ecologist and is based on the original model created for the BRIDE project in East Cork. The Farming with Nature team is dedicated to providing an accredited food brand that can be used for improving space for nature on a national scale and to reward food producers for doing so.
Farming With Nature – Progress to Date
The Farming with Nature programme is being developed as a holistic biodiversity brand from the ground up. The purpose of this brand is to produce Irish agricultural food and beverages in a nature positive environment, to monitor performance and reward best practice through market recognition.
Through the success of the previous BRIDE project at a local level, and through engagement with multiple stakeholders at a national and international level, the opportunity has arisen to build on the experiences of the pilot programme (and the information gathered to date) to reach farms at a national level.
However, despite the significant efforts of the BRIDE project team to-date, greater national exposure and engagement with farmers, is beyond the scope of the current BRIDE project and thus there is an opportunity to build on the work that has been initiated.
Farmers will benefit from having a robust, effective, rapid system to measure and assess the quality of habitats on their farm. Building on this, bespoke advice, relative to their habitats, can ensure appropriate management that maintains and develops areas of natural habitat on their individual farms.
