CAP expert warns of payment chaos
This week, the European Commission confirmed that member states can pay 50% of payments from Oct 16, rather than Dec 1.
However, paying agencies such as the department will be unable to accurately determine the payments to make in December until the very last minute, warned Alan Matthews, professor emeritus of European Agricultural Policy at Trinity College, and president of the European Association of Agricultural Economists.
Irish farmers will not know until the last moment how much their payments will have to be cut due to introduction of the new farm crisis reserve, and rising payments in 13 newer member states.
Last spring, the commission proposed to reduce all 2013 payments above €5,000 by 4.98%, except in Bulgaria, Romania and Croatia. But this has yet to be approved by agriculture ministers and the European Parliament, and the eventual reduction will probably not be known until the end of November, said Prof Matthews.
Also still in question is the threshold at which each farmer would be levied for the reduction.
Despite MEPs’ support for exempting payments under €5,000, in the political agreement on CAP reform at the end of June between agriculture ministers and the European Parliament, it was decided that all payments above €2,000 be reduced by 4.98%.
This would widen the scope of cuts to 30,000 smaller Irish farmers.
This week, EU ministers resisted demands from MEPs for talks on issues linked to the EU’s 2014-2020 budget agreement, which were left undecided in June, and which include the financial discipline cut.
Compulsory modulation cuts of 10% for payments over €5,000 and 14% for payments over €300,000 continue unchanged this year,
However, at least 80% of this money is returned to rural development funding in the countries from which it is deducted — unlike financial discipline cuts.
