How an SFI standards agreement works

This information explains what you’re agreeing to when you enter into a Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI) standards agreement, when it will start and what changes you can request once your agreement starts.

Entering into an agreement

When you submit your SFI application, we will process it. We’ll notify you when your SFI standards agreement offer is available in the Rural Payments service to review.

To enter into the agreement, you must accept it and sign it electronically. Your SFI standards agreement cannot start until you do this.

Your SFI standards agreement comprises the:

• agreement document, which you can view in the Rural Payments service
• standards you have chosen
• scheme terms and conditions

By accepting your SFI standards agreement, you are agreeing to follow the scheme terms and conditions. You should read them carefully before you accept it.

How to review your agreement offer

To review your SFI standards agreement offer, sign into the Rural Payments service. From your ‘Business overview’ page, select ‘Environmental Land Management Applications and Agreements’ and ‘Open agreement’. You can then select ‘Download’ to view your agreement offer.

You can only accept or reject your agreement offer. You cannot request changes to it. You need to accept or reject your agreement offer within 15 working days of it being available.

To accept or reject your agreement offer, you must have either ‘BPS amend’, ‘BPS submit’ or ‘Business details: full’ permission.

To accept your agreement offer, select ‘Accept’ and tick the box to confirm you have read the declaration, then select the ‘Accept’ button on that screen. This means you have electronically signed the agreement. You do not need to print your agreement offer to sign and return it to us.

To reject your agreement offer, select ‘Reject’. You will then see the ‘Reject agreement offer’ screen with a free text box. To help us understand why you’re rejecting your agreement offer, you need to enter the reason (at least 10 characters) to be able to select ‘Reject’ on this screen. Once you’ve entered the reason, select ‘Reject’ and you’ll see a message that confirms we’ve received your rejection.

As there is no deadline to apply for SFI, you can re-apply at any time.

When your agreement will start

SFI standards agreements do not all start on a single date. The start date for your agreement depends on when you submit your SFI application, how long it takes to process and how quickly you accept your agreement offer.

Your SFI standards agreement cannot start until you accept it. You need to do this within 15 working days of it being available to review in the Rural Payments service.

If you accept your agreement by the end of the calendar month, it will start on the first day of the following calendar month. If you do not, it will start later, on the next available start date.

Your SFI standards agreement will last for 3 years from its start date, as shown on your agreement document.

SubmitSubmitting an annual declaration to confirm progress of your agreement

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IfYour annual declaration will not be available to complete if:

• you’ve already told us about a ‘change of circumstances’, which means you’ve not been unableable to comply with your SFI standards agreement

• there are other outstanding queries about your SFI standards agreement

If this is the obligationscase, inyour annual declaration will not be available to complete until we’ve resolved these issues.

For the first year of your SFI standards agreement, youthe cannottable usebelow sets out when the annual declaration period opens and closes for each agreement start date.

Agreement start date	Declaration period opens	Declaration period closes
1 July 2022	1 May 2023	30 June 2023
1 August 2022	1 June 2023	31 July 2023
1 September 2022	1 July 2023	31 August 2023
1 October 2022	1 August 2023	31 September 2023
1 November 2022	1 September 2023	31 October 2023
1 December 2022	1 October 2023	30 November 2023
1 January 2023	1 November 2023	31 December 2023
1 February 2023	1 December 2023	31 January 2024
1 March 2023	1 January 2023	29 February 2024
1 April 2023	1 February 2024	31 March 2024
1 May 2023	1 March 2024	30 April 2024

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You’ll yousubmit mustyour annual declaration online in the Rural Payments service.

When we notify usyou (inthat writing,your asannual soondeclaration asis reasonablyavailable practicable)for ifyou thereto complete, sign in to the Rural Payments service, go to your ‘Business overview’ screen and select ‘SFI applications and agreements’.

If your annual declaration is available for you to complete, you’ll see an ‘Annual Declaration’ button. Select that and confirm if you’re in a position to submit your annual declaration.

If you’ve been unable to comply, or expect to be unable to comply, with the obligations under your SFI agreement for the relevant agreement year:

• select ‘No’

• tell us about the ‘change of circumstances.circumstances’ which has prevented you from complying with your SFI agreement

Read more about checking progress of your SFI standards agreement.

Requesting changes to your agreement

You’ll be able to request certain changes to your SFI standards agreement.

Upgrading your agreement

You can upgrade your SFI standards agreement to:

• add more standards
• increase levels within standards already in your SFI standards agreement
• add more land, including land coming out of a Countryside Stewardship agreement when it ends

You’ll be able to submit an upgrade request towards the end of the first and second years of your 3-year agreement.

The upgrade requests can include all of the upgrades you would like to request for the next agreement year. It will need to be submitted by a deadline.

We’ll publish more information about when and how to submit your upgrade request. We will not accept your annual upgrade request if it’s received after that date.

If we approve your upgrade request, you’ll need to confirm that you accept your updated SFI standards agreement by the date we’ll tell you. If you do this, your updated agreement will usually apply from the start of the following agreement year.

Your agreement will last for 3 years from its original start date.

If you do not accept your updated SFI standards agreement by the date we’ll tell you, your original agreement will continue without the upgrades.

If we reject your upgrade request, we’ll tell you why we have rejected it.

Removing standards, reducing the levels in the standards or land area in your SFI standards agreement or ending it early

You’re usually expected to deliver your SFI standards agreement for its 3-year duration without:

• removing standards
• reducing the level that you’ve selected for a standard
• removing land from the agreement
• ending the agreement early

In certain situations, it may be possible for you to do this before its 3-year duration is completed. For example, we may agree to do this if you have a change of circumstances that makes it impossible for you to deliver all or part of the agreement.

If we agree to remove standards, reduce levels of the standards or remove land, or end your agreement early, you may have to repay some, or all, of the money already paid to you.

Your SFI standards agreement payments are based on you completing the actions in the standards for a full agreement year, including submitting your annual declaration. If you have done this, you will not have to repay the money already paid to you. If you have not, you may need to make a repayment for the affected agreement year.

Transferring an SFI standards agreement to another person

It will not usually be possible for you to transfer an SFI standards agreement to another person.

If land in your SFI standards agreement is transferred to another person, for example it is sold or a tenancy ends and there is a new tenant, you must notify us about this change of circumstances in writing as soon as reasonably practicable.