Up Acre: What is the best way to diversify my land?

We don't need to tell you how hard farming will be this year; the Basic Payment Scheme has ended, the new environmental grants are overly bureaucratic and complicated, and many land grabbers are out to take advantage of struggling landowners. But what if there was on-hand support, free to use and with no sign-up to help diversify your land and keep the farm running for another generation? Enter Up Acre, a new diversification tool to help farms continue farming. This revolutionary online tool can give landowners diversification options suitable to their land in under a minute. Today, Up Acre already has over 100 farmers looking to diversify their land from renewable energy projects to nature-based solutions. Up Acre predicts that by the end of 2024, 4,000 acres will be diversified to maintain 36,000 acres of food-producing arable and pasture land for another generation. All this through a simple and free-to-use website; well, how does it work, and who is Up Acre?

Up Acre was founded in 2023 by Hal Brotherton–Ratcliffe when he and his father, Tony, found themselves discussing the land and the hardship landowners, specifically farmers, face in today’s market.

As the conversation continued, both Hal and Tony realised there was an even more significant issue in diversification and land development. As we all know, the world of land is a complicated industry, and with so many companies looking to take land out of food production for land banking and with landowners finding it more challenging to pay the bills, more and more land grabbers are starting to take advantage. The current method is to consult a land agent who gives specialist advice, which is very costly and time-consuming, with sometimes little to no success. However, after considering all this information and with Hal’s previous business experiences in tech and property development, Up Acre was born: a new, free-to-use tool – allowing any landowner to check what diversification will work on their land within one minute.

Working with some of the country’s top diversification companies and Geospatial data specialists, the Up Acre platform can quickly work out critical criteria and constraints within the land and surroundings to present options and the potential financial gains that could be received without the landowner having to wait weeks on end for a land agent. Up Acre is not designed to remove the land agents but to aid in the diversification process. Up Acre has a team of land experts to work alongside the platform, ready and able to delve deeper into the possibilities of diversifying. As Hal and the team understand, when dealing with something personal like land, you always need a trusted voice down the end of the phone.

But how does the platform work? Well, it’s pretty simple really:-

STAGE ONE

Go to Up-Acre.co.uk and type in the postcode of the land you wish to diversify.

STAGE TWO

You’ll be presented with an interactive map of the area. Using the simple draw feature, map out the location of the land you wish to explore. Remember, Grade 1 land will be automatically rejected by the algorithm (the aim is to help farmers, not end farming). Once drawn, click submit.

STAGE THREE

The Up Acre platform will then ‘crunch the numbers’. Scanning and calculating over 20,000,000 data points specific to the land drawn. This should take no more than one minute of your time and, when complete, will present the most suitable diversification options for your land.

What are the best options for diversifying land?

Solar Farms A large-scale solar installation connected to the grid 30 /40-year lease

Battery Storage An installation storing electricity to help energy sustainability over a 35-year lease

Hydroelectric Electricity generated by flowing water or falling water; a 30-year lease

Wind Farm A collection of wind turbines generating electricity for the grid 35-year lease

BNG(Lease) Enhances natural habitat, offsetting environmental impacts, 33-year lease

BNG(Joint Venture) Enhances natural habitat, offsetting environmental impacts, 30-year covenant

Carbon Credits Offset CO2 emissions through environmental conservation, such as tree planting.

ESG Investment Corporate investment into environmental, social and governance issues.

Camping Tent pitches are booked out over a set period of days for holidaymakers.

Glamping Investment into luxurious camping for holidaymakers and naturists.

Housing The purchase of land through options for house building and neighbourhoods.

All options are presented with an income estimation and an option to apply.

The income is continuously updated by Up Acre’s internal team, which analyses micro and macroeconomics, competition, government regulation, and Geospatial Data. As much as these are highly accurate, the pricing should only be taken as an estimation as so many variables can change at a site visit/survey.

STAGE FOUR

Once you click apply, you must fill in some personal information, such as name and contact details. This does not sign you up for anything, nor is it a data trap. It’s just so a member of the Up Acre team can contact you and discuss the land in detail before generating a diversification report on the land.

By ensuring high levels of customer service and a personal touch, Up Acre can mould the diversification option specifically to the landowner. The Up Acre team will work with one of their best-suited project partners to generate a report giving further details and specificity to the landowner. Once the report has been sent and discussed and all questions are answered, Up Acre will then pass the landowner over to the project partner for an introduction so they may start their diversification journey. But this is not the end; up, Acre will still be on hand to help bring the project to fruition as fairly and effectively as possible.

Up Acre was designed to aid in managing and diversifying headache land. If over the past few years, you have found farming isn’t paying the bills or if you think the next winters will only get more challenging, do give Up Acre a go. Giving the site five minutes of your time could end up with a project that keeps you farming for the next 30 years. It's free to use, with no nasty subscriptions, and you are not tied into anything until you exchange/sign contracts.

So why not visit https://www.upacre.co.uk,

or call on 020 3941 70 67

or email the team at info@upacre.co.uk

Up Acre – Make the Land Work For You

Up Acre operates exclusively in England and Wales, with an expansion planned for Scotland and Wales later next year. Up Acre does not operate in London or surrounding boroughs, as the business was predominantly designed for rural diversification.