Sustainable or equitable? - Farm support payments

THE Common Agricultural Policy and the Single Payment Scheme seem a closed book that cannot be reviewed but figures revealed today can hardly pass without some sort of scrutiny. 

Sustainable or equitable? - Farm support payments

The CAP consumes around 40% of the EU budget but farmers hardly make up 5% of the EU’s population. The majority of Irish farmers — almost 70% — are paid less than €10,000 a year under a scheme that supports 121,000 farmers to the tune of €1.2bn in a year, but overall farm supports cost €1.6bn. More than 200 farmers were paid more than €100,000 under SPS and two received over €300,000.

These are spectacular figures in a country that still has to borrow almost €10bn a year to make ends meet and most businesses would, naturally, envy that kind of support.

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