Wild Justice and The Commons

Commons and upland farming have been under the lens a lot recently. With the Secretary of State for DEFRA, Steve Reed, stating publicly that marginal land should be taken out of agriculture and protected for nature, followed hot on the heels by the Wild Justice case against Dartmoor Commoners Council around overgrazing, and a hot take from Chris Packham, what are the opportunities for change?

Let’s be honest - upland commoning isn’t working for many. The farmers are struggling, financially and with mental health. It’s an arduous job that brings moments of joy, but also clearly a lot of stress and anxiety. Millions in taxpayers money are poured into these landscapes to produce not very much, either in terms of food or nature. Despite protestations to those with a vested financial interest in keeping the sheep industry going, overgrazing has been clearly demonstrated to hugely negatively impact biodiversity, never mind associated practices such as burning on peat.

And this is at the heart of the Wild Justice case. Wild Justice assert that Dartmoor Commoners Council have broken the law by not assessing the moor for reasonable stocking numbers, nor issuing any limitation notices over the past 10 years, in which they have received £32 million to ensure our landscapes protected for nature thrive. In the most recent assessment by Natural England, only 26 hectares out of the 22,500 hectares surveyed were in favourable condition. Now, we can argue over the why, but those numbers are fairly terrifying. 

So what can be done at this point? Dartmoor has roughly 850 registered commoners, but less than 20% are estimated to be active, according to this report. So about 170 active graziers, over 47,000 hectares - an area more than 4 times larger than the city of Bristol. An area which provides drinking water for surrounding communities, which could provide carbon storage if its peatlands were restored - which incidentally would also prevent wildfires. 

We could look to what is actually required from our commons now. Do we really need sheep? Or do we need nature, carbon sequestration and wildfire prevention? Do we need a mixed of overgrazed edges and molinia deserts? Or do we need stonechats, pine martens and heather? What do the ordinary people, the common people, that live on and around Dartmoor think?