The problem with Window 1
When Window 1 opened on 30 June, plenty of farmers found out the hard way that their digital maps did not match what was actually on the ground. A parcel boundary had shifted. A piece of land had the wrong land cover recorded. One farmer discovered, three weeks into the process, that a field they wanted to include in their application was not showing correctly on their Rural Payments account at all.
None of that is unusual. It is also entirely avoidable, if you start checking now rather than in the last week of September.
Around 6,500 applications were submitted during Window 1, and by late August the Rural Payments Agency (RPA) had issued roughly 3,615 agreement offers, with the average offer arriving about 24 days after submission. Window 2 will open to every farmer and land manager in England, not just the small farms and new entrants Window 1 was designed for. That means far more applications competing for the same processing capacity, and far less patience for anyone whose paperwork is not in order.
What is actually changing on 22 September
Window 2 has a confirmed opening date of Tuesday 22 September 2026. Defra has said it will carry forward any budget not spent in Window 1, plus an extra £50 million added as part of the wider drought support package, bringing the Window 2 budget to £230 million.
The scheme rules stay the same as they were for Window 1: 71 actions are available, down from 102 under the old SFI24 extended offer, and each agreement is capped at £100,000 a year. You can only submit one SFI26 application per farm business, so it needs to be right the first time.
| Detail | Window 1 | Window 2 |
|---|---|---|
| Opened | 30 June 2026 | 22 September 2026 (expected) |
| Eligibility | Small farms (up to 50ha) and those without an existing ELM revenue agreement | All farmers and land managers in England |
| Budget | £60 million | £230 million (includes unspent Window 1 funds and drought top-up) |
| Applications submitted | Approximately 6,500 | Not yet open |
There is one genuinely new feature for Window 2. If your existing Environmental Land Management (ELM) revenue agreement, whether SFI or Countryside Stewardship, is due to expire by the end of February 2027, you can start your SFI26 application early and apply for that land before your current agreement ends. Defra plans to test this with a small number of farmers first before opening it up more widely, so do not assume it will be available to you on day one.
Fix your maps before you touch the application
This is the single most common reason applications stall. Defra has said explicitly that if your land parcels are not shown correctly on your digital maps, it may prevent you applying at all. Log into your Rural Payments account now and check that every parcel you plan to include is present, correctly bounded, and has the right land cover and land use recorded. If something is wrong, raise it with the RPA well before the window opens. Map corrections take time, and that time runs out fast once thousands of other farmers are submitting at once.
If your land sits within a Site of Special Scientific Interest, you also need consent from Natural England before the RPA can issue an agreement. That consent process sits outside the SFI26 application itself, so it needs to start early too.
Evidence: the part that gets left until the RPA asks for it
Every SFI26 action comes with its own evidence requirement, and you are expected to keep it for at least seven years from the end of your agreement. The RPA can check compliance through site visits, aerial and satellite monitoring, or desk-based reviews at any point during that period.
The evidence that actually holds up is the evidence created at the time, not reconstructed afterwards. A dated photograph taken the day a hedge was cut carries far more weight than one taken retrospectively to fill a gap. The same goes for field diary entries, spray records and input receipts.
| Evidence type | Why it matters |
|---|---|
| Dated, geotagged photographs | Show an action was carried out on specific land at a specific time |
| Field operation records | Confirm what was done, when, and by whom |
| Receipts and invoices | Prove inputs like seed or fertiliser were actually purchased and applied |
| Maps matched to actions | Show the right action was placed on the right parcel |
If you cannot produce it, it did not happen, at least as far as an RPA inspection is concerned. Probably fine is not a compliance strategy, and it is a lot more expensive to discover that after payment than before you apply.
What we still don't know
Defra has not confirmed the exact time applications open on 22 September, only the date. It also has not said how quickly the £230 million Window 2 budget is likely to be allocated once the scheme opens to all farmers, so there is no guarantee it will stay open for months the way Window 1 did. Details of a future SFI27 offer, for agreements ending after March 2027, have not been published either. Anyone in that position will need to keep watching the Defra Farming blog rather than assume anything about timing.
What to do now
Before 22 September, check your Rural Payments digital maps against what is actually on the ground and get any corrections moving. Pull together the evidence you already have for actions you are planning to claim, and start filling the gaps. If your current agreement expires by February 2027, work out whether the early application feature applies to you. And if you manage land across several parcels or several client farms, get your action plan mapped out now rather than during the application window itself.
This is exactly the gap JustFarm is built to close. It is a mapping tool, evidence organiser and planning system in one place, so instead of juggling spreadsheets, photo folders and a separate Rural Payments map, you can see your land, your planned actions and your supporting evidence together before you ever open the SFI26 form. You can create a free account and start getting your farm's evidence and mapping in order today, or explore the SFI page to see how it fits into a Window 2 application. Farms managing more land or advising multiple clients can view pricing for the tools built around exactly this kind of preparation.
SFI rewards prepared farms. With one shot per business and a hard eligibility check on your maps, September is not the time to start getting organised. Now is.
