Farmers at a meeting of the South West NFU tenant farmers’ forum have given a cautious welcome to the National Trust’s plans to encourage wildlife and create 65,000 acres of new habitats.

The Trust has announced that it intends make sure half the farmland it owns is ‘nature friendly’ by 2025 and the chairman of the forum, Cornish farmer Chris Cardell, said he was looking forward to hearing how the Trust was planning to communicate with farmers about this process.