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Farmers in Scotland will receive extra convergence funding over the next two years, but not at the expense of farmers in NI and England, UK prime minister Boris Johnson has confirmed.
The recommendation was made by an independent review panel set up last autumn to look at how convergence funding should be allocated in the UK in 2020 and 2021.
CAP convergence money was worth an extra €223m to the UK over the 2014-2020 period. It was allocated to the UK because it has an average payment per hectare below 90% of the EU average.
The extra money was spread across all UK regions, but Scottish farmers disputed this on the basis that the extra funds only came to the UK because of Scotland’s low average payment per hectare.
Unlike in NI, Scotland is split into three regions based on land type, with very low rates per hectare paid on marginal land.
The main recommendation from the Bew report is for the convergence budget to be split in 2020 and 2021, according to the proportion of land in each part of the UK that receives a low payment rate per hectare.
This would see England and NI’s annual budgets drop by €33m and €0.31m, while Scotland and Wales’s rise by €30m and €3m respectively.
However, Lord Bew’s report makes it clear that this extra money for Scotland and Wales should come from the British Treasury and not from existing UK agricultural funds.
“We cannot tolerate a reduction of funding to farmers in any part of the UK,” the report reads.
During a visit to a farm in Aberdeenshire last Friday, Johnson confirmed that the UK government will accept the funding recommendations of Lord Bew’s review. Over the two-year period an extra £51m will go to Scotland and £5m to Wales.
The extra funding comes on top of a separate £160m package for Scottish farmers which was announced by the British Chancellor Sajid Javid in his spending review last Wednesday.
This package is to cover historic convergence allocations and it will also be funded from the British Treasury. It follows up on a pledge made by Johnson during the Tory leadership campaign.
The debate in Scotland has now moved to how all this money will be spent.
Post-Brexit
Lord Bew’s report also argues a strong case for using future payments to UK farmers to incentivise food production, deliver environmental public goods and support the wider rural economy, particularly in upland areas.
“We encourage governments in all parts of the UK to recognise this value by protecting, if not enhancing, funding for agriculture in future,” the report reads.
UFU
Commenting on the Bew report this week, Ulster Farmers’ Union (UFU) president Ivor Ferguson emphasised that he could see “no credible argument” for using it to amend the current formula for the regional allocations of farm support.
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