Landmark progress on landscape resilience: New report shows significant environmental outcomes from regenerative agriculture

Landscape Enterprise Networks (LENs) has released its first-ever Impact Report, revealing powerful, real-world outcomes from two years of data. The report shows clear progress towards transforming European agriculture and supply chains through landscape-scale regeneration.

LENs brings together businesses, public bodies, non-governmental organisations (NGOs), farmers and land managers, to finance and implement initiatives to improve the health and resilience of the landscapes they all depend on. Operating since 2021, LENs is currently active in six regions: East of England, Yorkshire (England), Leven (Scotland), Western Hungary, Northern Italy and Western Poland.

Since its inception, LENs has channelled more than €24 million directly to land managers and farmers. Eleven organisations, including major food and drink companies such as Diageo, Nestlé and PepsiCo, have pooled resources to co-fund nature-based solutions at a landscape scale.

Donald Lunan, LENs CEO, says: “Environmental sustainability and economic resilience can and must go hand in hand. We need to work collaboratively across landscapes to mitigate the impacts of climate change and biodiversity loss. Sharing LENs’ collective impact in this report shows that real progress is possible.”

Transformational environmental outcomes

The report, Benefits for nature and carbon from transitioning to regenerative farming practices, is based on two complete annual cycles, gathered from 289 farms across five regions (Leven is a new region and not included in the analysis). The reporting is based on measured impact rather than projected measurements.

Key findings include:

• In the latest round of funding, 47,705 hectares of land is being supported by LENs with impacts which will be measured in 2025.
• In 2024, LENs-supported regenerative practices contributed to 49,370 tonnes CO₂e (carbon dioxide equivalent) in emissions reductions and removals, which equates to 100-year sequestration of ~140 ha of newly-planted native woodland.
• Soils saw an average increase of 1.83 tonnes of organic carbon per hectare in just one year, confirming recent studies that indicate combining multiple practices is an effective way to capture more soil carbon.
• Between 2023 and 2024 there was an average reduction of 14kg/ha of nitrogen on LENs farms.
• 73 hectares of biodiverse habitats have been created or restored, bolstering pollinator populations and wildlife since LENs began.

Empowering farmers and de-risking innovation

With a 79% farmer retention rate and average funding of €160/hectare, LENs is proving popular on the ground. Farmers report improved access to preferential lending, thanks to robust data from LENs’ industry-leading Measurement, Reporting and Verification (MRV) systems. More than €800,000 was invested in machinery and on-farm innovation in 2024, supporting trials of soil bio-stimulants, mechanical weeding, and novel nitrogen-fixation methods.

Philip Raley, a farmer in Yorkshire, describes the programme as “more farmer-led than any other funding initiative I’d come across… LENs involves us in deciding what’s best for the individual farm.”

Participating farms adopt a range of measures that include a) increasing crop and plant diversity, b) increasing soil cover, c) minimising soil disturbance, d) integrating livestock into arable systems, e) enhancing on-farm biodiversity and habitats. These aren’t specific to LENs; they build on principles supported by the regenerative agriculture movement, such as the farmer-led European Alliance for Regenerative Agriculture (EARA).

These practices help protect habitats and food production, improve air and water quality, mitigate flood risks and increase stored carbon. We track changes year on year, to understand how practices interact to support and accelerate wider landscape resilience.

Co-funding: amplifying impact

The LENs model of collaborative investment means environmental outcomes are delivered more efficiently. In 2024, in the East of England, more than half of practices implemented had costs shared by more than one funder, up from 29% the year before, with stacked measures lowering cost per hectare and boosting environmental returns.

“We work with LENs to mitigate our impact on the environment and build more resilience to our sourcing, helping to create a more regenerative food system. We work closely and collaboratively with the LENs team to achieve success,” says Cécile Doinel, Head of Regenerative Agriculture Purina Europe.

Aligning with net zero and nature goals

LENs equips its partners to report credibly on scope 3 emissions, carbon removals, and biodiversity through verified methodologies aligned with Science-Based Targets initiative Forest Land and Agriculture Guidance, the GHG Protocol Land Sector Removals Guidance, and the SAI Platform’s Regenerating Together Framework.

We continue to work with our funders and farmers to push progress on resilience. In 2025, we launched our Regen Pathway, which provides a clear, science-based framework for land managers to advance regenerative practices, linked to outcomes that support the achievement of carbon and biodiversity targets of our funders.