The Environmentally Sensitive Areas (ESA) program, when launched in the United Kingdom (UK) in 1986, was the first agri-environmental program in the European Union (EU). This program grew to a total of 43 designated ESA schemes in the UK as a whole, 22 of which were in England. A variety of...

The United Kingdom introduced the first agri-environmental scheme in the European Union in 1986. Since then, the United Kingdom has developed and implemented several other schemes that also feature stewardship payments to improve agriculture's environmental performance. In this article, lessons...