It’s the right thing this time. The European Commission announced on Wednesday 31st August that it had validated France’s implementation plan for the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) for the period 2023-2027. She had challenged an initial version that was deemed insufficiently green. The EU executive has also given the green light to plans by Denmark, Finland, Ireland, Poland, Portugal and Spain, according to a statement.
In April, the Commission had asked France, the first country to benefit from CAP funds, to review its “strategic plan” and “the low level of environmental and climate ambition” of the first version sent at the end of December, noting in particular insufficient support for organic Paris presented its new version in early July.
The new CAP, which will apply from January 2023, has a budget of 387 billion euros until 2027 – almost a third of the multiannual budget of the European Union – of which 270 billion are direct aids for farmers. Validated last year by the Member States and the European Parliament, it provides in particular for granting premiums to farmers who participate in more demanding environmental programmes, use more ecological techniques or contribute to improving animal welfare. States must spend an average of 25% of direct payments per year on these “eco-schemes” over the period 2023-2027.
Each country had to submit its “national strategy plan” (the way in which it will concretely distribute European aid) to the Commission for it to show its consistency with the spirit of the new CAP and the food strategy “From the Ferme à la Fourchette” ( 50% less pesticides by 2030, with a quarter of the area reserved for organic).
Among the weaknesses of the original French plan, Brussels had criticized the fact that Paris allows farmers with the High Environmental Value (HVE) certificate, whose criteria are much less restrictive than organic, to benefit from the highest aid provided for under the framework of eco-regimes. The Commission had also asked France to “define crop rotation requirements” aimed at promoting biodiversity and reducing fertilizer use, rather than applying a “general rule” of diversification.
On July 1, the French government presented new arbitration cases in which it proposed to increase the support of eco-schemes for organic farms by “creating a specific level” and the requirements (water management, biodiversity, reduction of pesticides ) of the HVE label, the subject of much criticism from agroecology defenders.