The Scottish Government has ruled out including agricultural property and agricultural land on the valuation roll.

Cabinet Secretary for Finance and the Constitution, Derek Mackay also ruled out rates for processing taking place on agricultural land in a statement to Parliament on Tuesday about recommendations of the Barclay Review of non-domestic rates.

This is welcome news for farmers and crofters, according to NFU Scotland.

“These were two key issues for NFU Scotland members, who believed that including agricultural property and agricultural land on the valuation roll when there was no intention to tax agricultural land would have generated a lot of work for nothing and raised concern over positive future tax creep,” NFU Scotland chief executive Scott Walker said.

“The Cabinet Secretary’s statement shows he shares our ambition to grow the agricultural industry and has recognised that implementing these measures would have been counter to this objective,” said Walker.