We now know Minister for Agriculture Charlie McConalogue’s proposals for the next CAP.

Armed with this knowledge, we can now provide you with the opportunity to calculate your direct payment for 2023.

All you need to know is your total basic payment for 2021, and the number of hectares you are claiming payments on (which is also the number of entitlements you apply for).

So, what will your basic payment be in two years’ time? The smartass answer is you won't have one. that no one will receive any basic payment in 2023. The basic payment will be no more after next year.

The basic payment was once called the single farm payment before the greening payment was siphoned off.

Now, farmers’ payment pots will see the eco schemes fund take 25% of your payment, frontloading, known as CRISS, take another 10%, and the young farmer top-up payment will harvest a further 3% from your 2021 basic payment.

That’s a total of 38% of direct cuts to your current payment, and to everyone else’s too. So to calculate your payment, first enter your current total payment. Then we take 38% away to create what will be known as the Basic Income Support for Sustainability, or BISS.

The BISS is effectively the building block for payments for 2023-2027. Each farmer’s CRISS (frontloading) payment will be added back in, as will the eco-scheme payment if you qualify for that scheme.

However, before we make any additions, we first have to make a final deduction.

The National Reserve will be awarded 3% of every farmer’s BISS pot. With that removed, we now have the BISS payment you will receive in 2023.

Now we can add back the extra direct payment elements.

We’re going to be optimistic and say that you will qualify for the eco-scheme payment. If you do, you will receive about €63 for every hectare of eligible land you own. So we first add that in.

next comes the frontloaded payment, the CRISS. This is again an area-based payment, but will only be paid out on the first 30ha. So you need to again put in your total hectarage, but only up to a maximum of 30ha. If you have more than 30ha of land and entitlements, put 30 into this column.

The CRISS will be paid out at the rate of €64 on the first 30 ha. This is the third and final element of your direct payment.

Sum total

So there we have it. Your 2023 payment will be your BISS, your CRISS and your eco-schemes payment combined. The figure staring at you from the bottom of this reckoner is the figure you will receive in 2023.

Well, almost. There is one final element - convergence. Convergence will cut higher per-hectare entitlement and lift lower entitlements. The minister proposes to deliver the minimum required amount of convergence - 85%. That will happen in four equally staged adjustments over the 2023-2026 period.

We simply don’t know as yet how much this will affect payments, but it is likely that much of the converging of payments will have been taken care of by the other measures. It may be only a couple of euros taken or added per hectare per year. As the Department models out the effect of the other measures, some clarity will emerge as to the exact figures. In the meantime, we can say that this is very close to the payment you will receive.