Thousands of farmers face being locked out of supports as a result of CAP delays. The European Commission has accepted the new policy will not be ready in time for 2021 and has introduced temporary regulations to extend the current CAP by at least a year. However, Minister for Agriculture Michael Creed said it was “highly unlikely that CAP will be ready”.

The minister told the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture on Tuesday that a minimum period of two years was more likely.

GLAS and BDGP

There are 58,227 contracts due to expire at the end of 2020 across GLAS I and II and BDGP I. These farmers will be left without replacements for almost €200m in supports.

We have a lot to do in the next decade

Minister Creed said work was under way to influence the temporary regulations to allow farmers whose contracts expire or have already expired to join pilot initiatives.

The minister hinted the pilots would be in the area of climate: “We have a lot to do in the next decade. We are entering into a new decade and we have targets to achieve which are quite onerous by 2030. So we need to be starting immediately.”

Payments

Currently, the Commission’s transitional regulations would facilitate direct payments and payments to farmers still under contract in GLAS III and BDGP II to continue.

“We don’t have clarity around what will be facilitated in that transitional directive yet, and it’s unlikely to be finalised, I would imagine for perhaps mid-2020,” he said.