Funding for Green Farming Schemes Remains Critical

Funding for green farming schemes remains a critical issue as confusion over greening of the CAP continues Commenting on an EFRA Select Committee report into proposals to reform the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), so it delivers more for the environment, Ian Woodhurst, CPRE’s Senior Farming Campaigner says:
 “As the Committee has discovered, there is complete confusion about how these new ‘greening’ proposals will work, and whether they will provide any real environmental improvements. Europe’s taxpayers could easily end up short changed by a greenwash that delivers limited benefits for the countryside and its wildlife.”
CPRE has called for a much more radical reform with the CAP refocused on providing much greater levels of support for environmental schemes that reward farmers for maintaining, restoring and enhancing the wildlife habitats and landscape features that makes our countryside so special. Progress on reforming the CAP is behind schedule and can’t be agreed until all member states sign off the next budget for the European Union.
Ian Woodhurst continued, “The Government still has a lot of work to do to improve these greening proposals so that the CAP delivers more for the environment. The Government will also need to negotiate a much better deal for the UK from the next European Union budget to secure the funding we need to improve the environmental quality of our farmland.
“If they fail we risk being left with a CAP that delivers less for the environment and less for UK taxpayers.”