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Concept
Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
Summary
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) is a department of His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom responsible for environmental protection, food production and standards, agriculture, fisheries and rural communities in the entire United Kingdom. Concordats set out agreed frameworks for co operation, between it and the Scottish Government, Welsh Government and Northern Ireland Executive, which have devolved responsibilities for these matters in their respective nations.
Defra also leads for the United Kingdom on agricultural, fisheries and environmental matters in international negotiations on sustainable development and climate change, although a new Department of Energy and Climate Change was created on 3 October 2008 to take over the last responsibility; later transferred to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy following Theresa May's appointment as Prime Minister in July 2016.
The department was formed in June 2001, under the leadership of Margaret Beckett, when the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (MAFF) was merged with part of the Department of Environment, Transport and the Regions (DETR) and with a small part of the Home Office.
It was created after the perceived failure of MAFF to deal adequately with an outbreak of Foot and Mouth disease. The department had about 9,000 core personnel, .
In October 2008, the climate team at Defra was merged with the energy team from the Department for Business Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (BERR), to create the Department of Energy and Climate Change, then headed by Ed Miliband.
The Defra Ministers are as follows in October 2022:
The Permanent Secretary is Tamara Finkelstein, who replaced Clare Moriarty in 2019.
Defra is responsible for British Government policy in the following areas
Adaptation to global warming
Agriculture
Air quality
Animal health and animal welfare
Biodiversity
Conservation
Chemical substances and pesticides
Fisheries
Flooding
Food
Forestry
Hunting
Inland waterways
Land management
Marine policy
National parks
Noise
Plant health
Rural development
Sustainable development
Trade and the environment
Waste management
Water management
Some policies apply to England alone due to devolution, while others are not devolved and therefore apply to the United Kingdom as a whole.
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