Following the launch today at the Royal Welsh Show of a further Welsh Government consultation on CAP, the Union will now use the consultation period to consult with its membership on the decisions the Minister intends to make over the implementation of direct payments in Wales.
The consultation highlights the specific subsidiary policy goals for the creation of the direct payments system in Wales. These include: the need to minimise financial disruption and risk to farms in the transition from historical to area based payments; to keep red tape to a minimum; secure a level playing field for greening and cross compliance; simplify where possible; make entitlements available to new and young entrants and focus support on active farmers.
NFU Cymru President, Ed Bailey said, “These policy goals are all laudable and fit closely with the key priorities that NFU Cymru has set for this reform process from the outset. The issue will be whether the Minister’s ultimate decisions match those aspirations. I am sure this will be the focus of discussions with our members over the next few months.
“I believe on greening, with the Minister stating his intention to give Welsh farmers the full range of greening options as proposed within the CAP political agreement, his intentions mirror the policy goal.
“With regards to the transition from historic to an area based payment system and the use of a differential payment rate system, our view and the very clear mandate that we have from our members, is that the Minister should implement a system that minimises redistribution as much as possible between faming businesses, sectors and areas of Wales. Ahead of the Minister making his final decision we would urge him to ensure that his officials explore every avenue and continue with extensive modelling and analysis to ensure that aim is achieved.
“The consultation highlights that less support will be available as a result of budget cuts and we also know that Wales will continue to have one of the lowest average per hectare direct payment rates across Europe. If we are to be able to maintain our competitiveness with the rest of Europe then we must maintain our support for direct payments, it is for this reason that we do not support transfer of resource from Pillar 1 to Pillar 2.
“It appears from the consultation that the Minister is minded to move resource out of Pillar 1 but has yet to decide how much, I would urge caution and a full consideration of the impact that this could have on Welsh agricultural production before the Minister makes a final decision.
“This consultation is an extremely important one for Welsh agriculture, it will impact on every farming business in Wales, it is important that we now spend time to discuss this with our wider membership before responding fully in the autumn.”
