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Scotland’s Finest Woods Awards

These awards celebrate the contribution that woodlands can make to the people, environment and economic prosperity of Scotland

Farm Woodland Awards

The 2025 Awards Programme
is open for entries!

We are delighted to be running the Farm Woodland Award in 2025 – entries are now open.  We will provide any updates about the Awards’ programme here on the website or through our social channels – Twitter and LinkedIn.

What are the Farm Woodland Awards for?

Farm and croft woodlands are an important part of Scotland’s landscape with a variety of woodland types.  The Awards are to reward the very best of Scotland’s Farm Woodlands that demonstrate exemplary use of both woodland and agricultural practice with benefits being delivered to both the farming/crofting operation and the quality of woodland management.  With one competition, the Farm Woodland Award category demonstrates the integration of trees into the farming business to show the added benefit of trees on a farm which may help the business to grow, become more resilient, or increase biodiversity.  Farm woodland can contribute to carbon sequestration and can benefit the farm and farmer in many ways such as shelter, shade, biodiversity, riparian, flood management and run-off prevention.  

Please note where ‘farm’ or ‘farming’ is used this also applies to ‘croft’ or ‘crofting’.

Who can enter which Award?

Entry is open to active farmers/crofters and/or for one competition their forester with the active farmer/crofter’s support, anywhere in Scotland.  The farm/croft must have a Rural Payments’ Business Reference Number (BRN) and the farmer/crofter must be directly involved, to a greater or lesser extent, with the farm/croft woodland management that forms part of the farming business and is to its benefit.

There is one competition:

  • All farm/croft woodlands that are located in Scotland that may be managed by one or more people.

What type of farm/croft woodland(s)?

The area of woodland must be 2 hectares (4.9 acres) or more in size, with tree canopy cover of at least 20% (or the potential to achieve this if a young woodland).  It can be of any established tree species or woodland type and contain integral open space and/or woody shrubs or other farm crops/ground cover.  If the woodland is younger or of mixed age it may have been established by planting or natural regeneration on previously bare or cropped land or on land that has previously had tree cover.  There may be one or more woodland areas on the farm/croft that are included in the entry.

There must be benefits to the farming/crofting operations, ideally improving productivity and the wood(s) should form part of the financial sustainability of the farm/croft holding.  The farm/croft’s woodland(s) will be used in a sustainable and potentially enterprising way with responsible management providing direct farming benefits.  For example:  generating income from sustainably managed woods; using biomass, fuelwood or wood chips on site or selling these as a renewable, clean, carbon neutral energy; or creating new woodlands to off-set carbon produced from agricultural operations; or for livestock shelter, sporting interests, amenity or other objectives.  The farm/croft must be actively managed with a BRN.

Full entry criteria are in the entry form – see link below.

Judging

The judges aim to visit short-listed entries over the summer.  You will be contacted by the judges directly regarding any site visit.

Our judges’ task is to find and reward the pursuit of excellence!

Prizes

A £1,000 cash prize is usually available to the winning project at the discretion of the judges and other high quality entries may receive a judges’ commendation.

In addition,  the prestigious Lilburn Trophy (kindly gifted by the Royal Highland and Agricultural Society of Scotland) is awarded as the Farm Woodland Award for All Farm / Croft will be awarded at the discretion of the judges with custody for one year The winner and commended entries will also receive a certificate and a commemorative wooden plaque recording their achievement.

How to enter Farm Woodland Awards

Do you have a winning project in 2025?  Download the entry form below.  After reading the How to Enter and Guidance for Entrants, complete the entry form if your project satisfies all the criteria, referring to the Supporting Information and Images section in the guidance.  You may include relevant supporting information especially videos and photographs with your entry to help our judges in their decision making – further details stated in Guidance for Entrants.

If eligible, you may enter more than one category (up to three – please check each category form for specific questions).

Closing date for entries:  

Please submit your completed entry by email as early as possible and by 23:59 on Saturday, 31st May 2025 at the latest.  Late entries will not be considered.

More info …

See list of past winners here >>

Contact person:

Jean Nairn
Scotland’s Finest Woods
Email: admin@sfwa.co.uk
Tel: 07954 847055
Socials:  Twitter; LinkedIn


Award Sponsors:

The Farm Woodland Award is supported by:

Fountains Forestry UK Ltd - logo