Issue link: https://htpgraphics.uberflip.com/i/464860
17 AGRICULTURE EDITION REVIEW OF THE YEAR | guidance on its website for farmers who were considering diversifying. It began with a reality check: 'Farm diversification is not guaranteed to boost your farming business and can be a complex process.' But it added: 'About half of all UK farms use some form of diversified activity in their farming business, and these bring an average of £10,400 extra revenue per farm.' It listed the range of opportunities available to farmers considering branching out and adding new ventures to their core farming business, including non-agricultural ones such as tourist accommodation, offering training in and promotion of rural crafts and arts such as dry-stone walling workshops, and generating electricity. A November 2013 farming conference organised by trade association RenewableUK considered how helping farmers enter the micro-energy- generation sector could help the nation meet its future food and energy needs. Analysts told delegates that farmers could earn up to £50,000 a year from generating electricity from wind energy. 'There are about 300,000 farms in the UK, so if you are going to have renewable-energy generation at any level of scale, farmers have the land and the capacity,' explained Nicky Conway, principal sustainability adviser for Forum for the Future. 'Therefore they should be a target audience because they have the land and the resources to produce the energy,' she added. Hill farmer Robin Hanbury-Tenison said, in his experience, the 'fuel versus food' argument was a false one. 'My sheep prefer being under or around the panels than being in the open fields. The grass grows better, they also have lovely shelter and they lamb underneath them,' he said. In May 2014, however, the government unveiled proposals to limit the subsidies paid to large solar farms. It said that from April 2015 owners of installations bigger than 5 megawatts (MW) would have to compete with other renewables for financing. The Department of Energy & Climate Change said it wanted to encourage the development of smaller scale and community energy production. Campaigners condemned the move, saying it would undermine investor confidence. In May 2014 the government unveiled proposals to limit the subsidies paid to solar farms larger than 5 MW