Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

Defra is a member of UKCDS and its Chief Scientific Adviser, Professor Robert Watson, is UKCDS interim chair.

Defra is the UK government department responsible for policy and regulations on the environment, food and rural affairs. 

Priorities: 

• to support and develop British farming and encourage sustainable food production
• help to enhance the environment and biodiversity to improve quality of life
• support a strong and sustainable green economy, resilient to climate change.

A major policy area is sustainability with the department charged with leading the government-wide sustainability strategy, Securing the Future.

Defra helps deliver the government's International Poverty Reduction priorities by working closely with the Department of International Development (DFID). 

Research

Defra spends around £300 million each year on research covering a range of social and natural science disciplines.

Research is delivered through:

• The department's Research & Analysis team
• Calls and competitions for research projects to inform policy
• Large cross-disciplinary research programmes like Living with Environmental Change
• Science agencies and public bodies such as the Environment Agency

Defra also supports The Darwin Initiative, a programme that has funded more than £73 million for collaborative bioscience projects involving UK and developing country researchers.

The scheme assists countries rich in biodiversity but poor in financial resources to meet major biodiversity Conventions through the funding of collaborative projects which draw on UK biodiversity expertise.

And Defra supports the Sustainable Development Research Network and the Consultative Group on International Agriculture Research (CGIAR).