When issuing land under liberalized lease, Staatsbosbeheer does not only select the highest bidder. In the new allocation procedure, Staatsbosbeheer gives a heavy weight to the 'quality' component, as can be seen from the brochures accompanying the registration round on pachtgrond.nu. Farmers who participate in nature-inclusive agriculture (NIL) have an advantage.
Staatsbosbeheer has significantly revised the registration conditions for the liberalized lease. The nature manager has drawn up a list of criteria for the allocation to which points are awarded. The registering farmer must score at least 50 points on the quality component to be awarded the lease. Points are awarded to the tenderer for, among other things, a Skal or PlanetProof certificate, gold, silver or bronze in the CAP, nature management and entrepreneurship certificate, SNL and ANLb. Using a formula based on the registration price and the points achieved, land is allocated to the highest scoring tenderer.
Long term relationship
Farmers who work in a nature-inclusive manner are preferred by the nature organization. "Staatsbosbeheer likes to work with nature-inclusive farmers who are not only committed to the natural values on the leased land, but also on their own land and therefore the rest of their business. Because these farmers make their entire own business operations nature-inclusive, we want to support them by to conclude twelve-year contracts," the brochures read. If you put it clearly, the legal task - managing the entrusted sites and bringing them to sustainable social benefit - is interpreted broadly by Staatsbosbeheer. The tenderer's expressed interest in nature-inclusive agriculture will not be taken into account in the allocation.
Staatsbosbeheer says it manages more than 270.000 hectares of nature. Of this, approximately 40.000 hectares are leased to approximately 3.000 farmers for agricultural shared use. This mainly concerns grassland that is only mowed and grazed to a limited extent by farmers. According to the website of Staatsbosbeheer Leasing of land is necessary for various reasons. "First of all, because we cannot do all of that management ourselves. For example, mowing often has to be done in June or July. It is too much work for us to mow all the plots during that period." Another striking passage on the same web page: "The nature that we cherish so much in the Netherlands is not wild nature. Parts of it once consisted of agricultural grasslands and have been transformed into a nature reserve."