Farming

CAP Reform

Rural sceneThe European Union’s Common Agricultural Policy provides financial support to farmers for a range of farming environmental and rural development activities as well as controlling EU agricultural markets.

 

New CAP payments web service goes live

A new web service detailing payments made to beneficiaries under the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) went live on the 30 September 2008. The details of all payments made via rural development schemes in the UK from 1 January 2007 to 15 October 2007 are available on the internet. See CAP Payments Search web pages. A news release has been issued.

CAP Health Check – the latest reform of the CAP

On 20 November 2008, agreement was reached in Agriculture Council on the CAP Health Check – a scheduled review and adjustment of the mechanisms of the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy, which was intended to improve, reinforce and build on previous CAP reforms.

  • Further decoupling of direct farm payments from production in sectors such as arable crops.
  • Phasing out the remaining processing aid schemes for dried fodder, starch, flax and hemp.
  • Further limits on market controls, including the abolition of compulsory set-aside and the introduction of a tendering system for wheat intervention.
  • Agreement on the process for phasing out milk quotas by 2015, including a basic 1% per year increase in quotas over the next five years, though with some differential increases for some countries.
  • Reducing red tape for farmers through some simplification of direct farm payments and the requirements of cross-compliance.
  • Increasing the rate of `compulsory modulation’ across the EU from 5% to 10% by 2012, and therefore increasing the share of CAP funding that goes towards environment and rural development schemes.
  • The option for countries to use cross-compliance to help address the environmental effects of ending set-aside.

Overall, the UK Government takes the view that the agreement reached on the Health Check is a step in the right direction of further reform, but is also a missed opportunity to speed up the process of change. Europe needs a fundamentally reformed CAP to deal with the key challenges of the 21st Century, including globalisation, tackling climate change, creating a sustainable environment and protecting natural resources.

We were also  disappointed that the Health Check was unable to go further in reforming the CAP, and we are concerned about the market distortions created by the increased flexibility in the use of `national envelopes’ which allow Member States to reintroduce production-coupled payments to support specific farming sectors. The European Commission will be developing implementing regulations in early 2009, and the UK Government will also consult publicly on aspects of implementation. Further details information on specific changes to regulations will be published when they are available.

A final overall impact assessment for the Health Check can be found at:

More details on the Health Check can be found at:

EU Budget Review

The UK continues to attach great importance to the Budget Review. It must be a genuinely fundamental, strategic and ambitious exercise, conducted openly, creatively and from first principles to achieve proper effective reform. In line with our Vision, the Common Agricultural Policy needs far reaching reform, including the phasing out of spending on Pillar 1, with payments under a reshaped Pillar 2 of the CAP focusing on delivering environmental benefits that the market wouldn’t otherwise deliver.

Further information on the Budget Review can be found at:

A Vision for the Common Agricultural Policy

This paper, published in December 2005, sets out a vision for the future of the European Union’s Common Agricultural Policy. Its aim is to stimulate and help inform debate.

Although important progress has been achieved recently in reforming the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), it remains the most visible and expensive common policy of the EU, but is increasingly out of step with the need for Europe to respond to the challenges of globalisation. Internationally, it continues to attract criticism, to create tensions in the EU’s relations with trading partners, and to impose significant costs on developing countries. Domestically, it imposes substantial costs on consumers and taxpayers but is inefficient in delivering support to farmers and promoting an attractive rural environment. Indeed much of the CAP still has a negative impact on the environment.

The vision in this paper focuses on where we need to be in 10 to 15 years time, and why. It does not set out a route map for getting there. That must be the subject of debate across Europe.

  • Chapter 1 discusses what a sustainable model of European agriculture might look like.
  • Chapter 2 considers the CAP from a sustainable development perspective and sets out the economic, financial, social and environmental costs to the EU of the CAP.
  • Chapter 3 examines the scope for further reform of the CAP through a series of questions.
  • Chapter 4 sets out the international dimension and the impact of protectionism on developing countries.
  • Download "The Vision for the Common Agricultural Policy" (PDF 450 KB)

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Page last modified: 16 February 2009
Page published: 20 July 2004

Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs