Moving EU farm payments to single flat rate is too radical: Coveney

Moving European farm payments to a single flat rate model by 2019 is too radical and risks penalising more productive farmers, according to Agriculture Minister Simon Coveney and his newly-appointed French counterpart, Stéphane le Foll.

At their meeting in Paris yesterday, they pledged their support for a strong and properly financed CAP in the future. This effectively restated the common goals established between Mr Coveney and Mr le Foll’s predecessor, Bruno Le Maire, notably in regards to common French and Irish doubts about the proposed move to a flat farm payments model.

Mr Coveney said: “We had a good discussion on this issue. Ireland’s priority is to obtain as much flexibility as possible for member states with regard to payment models and transitional arrangements. We would envisage an approximation model that would go part but not all of the way towards convergence and would limit the gains and losses for individual farmers.