Water Management & Abstraction
Water Management: For Farmers
What Water Management changes for the person actually doing the work.
For the person running the business, the test of any farm software is whether it removes work or adds it. Water is moving from an assumed input to a constrained and licensed one. This module holds every abstraction licence and its conditions, tracks actual abstraction against annual and daily limits, monitors restriction notices and hands-off flow conditions, and produces the returns each regulator requires — before a breach becomes an enforcement matter.
In their words
What the job actually looks like
These are not marketing personas. Each one is a distinct job with a distinct constraint, and the module is designed so that solving one does not create work for the others.
Irrigated vegetable grower
Multiple abstraction licences
Needs the licence position visible daily during the abstraction season.
- Register every licence and its conditions
- Map sources and metering points
- Capture readings continuously
- Track position against limits
Dairy farmer
High parlour and stock water use
Needs to find losses before they show on the bill.
- Map sources and metering points
- Capture readings continuously
- Track position against limits
- Monitor restrictions and hands-off flows
Estate manager
Multiple holdings and licences
Needs a portfolio view of licence headroom.
- Capture readings continuously
- Track position against limits
- Monitor restrictions and hands-off flows
- Adjust use or invoke the drought plan
End to end
How Water Management runs, start to finish
The module is modelled as a state machine, so at any point the business knows exactly which stage every record is at and what has to happen next.
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1
Register every licence and its conditions
This is where the record starts, and getting it right here removes work at every later stage.
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2
Map sources and metering points
The platform prompts only for what this stage genuinely needs, and carries everything forward.
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3
Capture readings continuously
Conflicts with scheme rules, regulatory windows and existing commitments are flagged here rather than discovered later.
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4
Track position against limits
Capture works offline, so this stage is completed in the field rather than remembered afterwards.
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5
Monitor restrictions and hands-off flows
Everything recorded at this point becomes evidence automatically, in every format that will later ask for it.
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6
Adjust use or invoke the drought plan
This is the stage most businesses currently do twice, once for the operation and once for the paperwork.
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7
Submit regulatory returns
Results feed the whole-farm view, so the effect of this stage is visible against the rest of the business.
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8
Review efficiency and plan investment
The cycle closes here, and what is learned is carried into next season's plan rather than lost.
Capabilities
What Water Management does
Every capability below is built on the same underlying record, so entering something once is enough for it to appear wherever it is needed.
Record and plan
- Abstraction licence register with all conditions, volumes and points of abstraction
- Meter reading capture with automated and manual entry
- Real-time position against annual and daily authorised volumes
Operate and monitor
- Hands-off flow and restriction notice monitoring with alerting
- Regulatory abstraction return preparation and submission record
- Water source mapping — surface, groundwater, mains and harvested
Comply and evidence
- Water use accounting by enterprise, field and purpose
- Trickle irrigation and de minimis exemption tracking
- Licence variation, transfer and renewal workflow
Analyse and improve
- Drought plan with tiered response triggers
- Water efficiency benchmarking per tonne or per litre of output
- Farm water audit with leak and loss identification
Obligation calendar
What water management asks of you, and when
Windows, deadlines and recurring obligations for England. Set a different nation and the calendar reconfigures; farm across a border and it shows both, reconciled.
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February 1 entry
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3 February: Animal Health and Welfare Pathway
Rolling application.
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April 1 entry
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20 April: Adding Value Grant
Round-based.
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May 1 entry
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20 May: Capture readings continuously
A recurring step in water management.
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June 2 entries
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5 June: Farming Transformation Fund
Round-based by theme.
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15 June: Sustainable Farming Incentive 2026
Two windows in 2026: window one from 30 June, window two from September.
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July 2 entries
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14 July: Slurry Infrastructure Grant
Round-based.
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17 July: Water Management Grant
Round-based.
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September 1 entry
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12 September: Map sources and metering points
A recurring step in water management.
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October 1 entry
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5 October: Farming Equipment and Technology Fund
Round-based, usually open for a defined application period.
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November 4 entries
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12 November: Improving Farm Productivity Grant
Round-based.
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27 November: Environmental Land Management Capital Grants
Round-based, with rapid allocation once open.
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27 November: Track position against limits
A recurring step in water management.
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28 November: Register every licence and its conditions
A recurring step in water management.
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December 1 entry
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26 December: Countryside Stewardship
Rolling and round-based depending on the tier and option group.
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Worked example
How a business like yours would use Water Management
The problem: Needs the licence position visible daily during the abstraction season.
What they do
- Register every licence and its conditions
- Map sources and metering points
- Capture readings continuously
- Track position against limits
What changes
- Percentage of licensed volume used
- Returns submitted on time
- Restriction days experienced
This is an illustrative worked example built from the module design, not a customer reference. Named case studies are published only with the business's written consent.
What we are hearing
The problems people describe to us
These are composite statements drawn from user research conversations, not attributed customer quotes. We publish named references only with written consent.
I am not short of software. I am short of one place where the same field means the same thing in all of it.
The scheme closed on a Tuesday evening. I had the application half built. Nobody told me the budget was nearly gone.
We farm on both sides of the border. Everything takes twice as long and I still cannot see the whole position on one screen.
Audit week costs me three days. Every single record they ask for is already written down somewhere on this farm.
Measurement
How you will know it is working
The module reports against these measures from the day it is switched on, so the value is demonstrable rather than assumed.
- 01Percentage of licensed volume used
- 02Returns submitted on time
- 03Restriction days experienced
- 04Water use per unit of output
- 05Losses identified and fixed
Free assessment
Find out where you stand in about ten minutes
A structured assessment producing a scored report with a prioritised list of what to fix first, and what it is worth fixing.