Brussels, 28/10/2011 (Agence Europe) - In similar vein to the last Council, it was new aid linked to environmentally friendly farming practices (crop diversification, maintaining permanent grassland, maintaining biodiversity and ecological focus areas) and the new allocation of aid among countries that attracted the most criticism when EU experts discussed the impact assessment of the reform of the common agricultural policy (CAP) on Monday 24 October.
At the Special Committee on Agriculture (SCA) meeting on Monday, the Commission set out the impact assessment for delegations, concentrating on particular issues (direct payments, rural development, young farmers and small farms). The Commission looked at three reform options: adjustment (little change but a “facelift” to tweak problems), integration (corresponding largely to CAP reform proposals) and retargeting (which restricts CAP intervention to environmental issues).
More than 10 countries (including Finland, Austria, Sweden, Germany and the Czech Republic) feel that the reform as a whole is not sufficiently geared towards simplification, as had been agreed. Proposals on the “greening” of 30% of CAP aid proved problematical for several delegations (mainly because of poor assessment of the costs that would be involved - Germany, Italy, Greece, Finland, Hungary, Ireland and Sweden all made comments to that effect).
The other issue that stood out in the debate was the planned redistribution of aid. A large number of countries called for clarification of the data to be used in calculating their new national aid allocations. Estonia, Lithuania and Poland said that the redistribution did not go far enough in supporting their farmers. Italy called for the value added of agricultural production to be included in the aid redistribution criteria. Several countries (Greece, Denmark, Spain, Ireland and the United Kingdom) highlighted the major impact of redistribution within countries with the move to regionalised payments (as proposed by the Commission).
The effect of the reform on developing countries should be more carefully assessed, in the view of some delegations, such as those of the Netherlands and Sweden. Discussion will continue at the next SCA meeting on Monday 7 November. (LC/transl.rt)