Plans under the common agricultural policy and ecology

The European Court of Auditors (ECA) has published a special report: Plans under the Common Agricultural Policy. In the report, the Court found that the plans are greener than the solutions in the previous CAP period, but still fall short of the EU’s climate and environmental ambitions, and lack key elements for assessing environmental performance.

Common agricultural policy and ecology

The Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) is one of the key policies of the European Union, accounting for 31 percent (€378.5 billion) of the EU budget for 2021-2027. The CAP not only provides equitable income support for farmers, food security and rural livelihoods, but also aims to strengthen environmental protection, including biodiversity, and climate action. The aim of the new CAP legislation is to raise the level of environmental and climate ambition.

Is ecology included in the plans of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP)?

In a prepared report, the ECA assessed whether the CAP’s strategic plans for 2023-2027 provide a solid basis for the goal of a greener CAP. The report found that the 2023-2027 plans are greener than the solutions in the previous CAP period, but do not match the EU’s climate and environmental ambitions, and lack key elements for assessing environmental performance. Overall, the final versions of the plans do not show a significant increase in environmental ambition compared to the previous period. In addition, the actual climate and environmental impact of the plans is adversely affected by measures recently introduced by the European Commission in response to recent demands from farmers.

While these changes make it easier for farmers to meet conditionality requirements, the environmental and climate benefits are less. For example, crop rotation (GAEC 7), which was intended to improve soil quality, has now become optional. GAEC 8 was intended to improve biodiversity by requiring a minimum proportion of land to be dedicated to non-productive elements, but this is no longer required. Member states must instead offer support for non-productive areas and new landscape elements within ecoschemes. The use of ecoschemes, however, remains voluntary for farmers, and will likely come at the expense of other ecological activities. We wrote about these changes in a previous article: European Green Deal – EC updates assumptions.

Has the European Green Deal been included in common policy plans?

The ECA also found that the plans are not aligned with the goals and objectives of the European Green Deal. First, its goals were not incorporated into CAP legislation. Second, the European Commission – in the absence of quantitative estimates from the member states – has not been able to measure (with the exception of the increase in the area of land under organic cultivation) the contribution of the plans to the goals of the Green Deal. Third, the Court’s analysis shows that the achievement of the Green Deal goals largely depends on actions planned outside the CAP. Fourth, while the plans include some key agricultural practices to address long-term climate and environmental challenges, some other but still key practices are not sufficiently covered in the selected plans.

CAP funding for climate and environment

Under the 2023-2027 CAP, 40 percent of the spending provided for in the plans will be allocated for climate-related purposes. Applying the weights specified in the regulation, the European Commission calculated that for the period under review, 47 percent of the financing provided for in the plans, or €123 billion, is climate-related.

ECA’s key recommendations on CAP plans

According to recommendations made within the report, in order to ensure greater use of good ecological practices in CAP plans, the European Commission should promote ecoschemes practices, as well as practices and solutions to better deal with long-term climate and environmental challenges.

In addition, according to the ECA, reports on the plans’ contribution to the Union’s environmental and climate-related commitments, to be submitted by the European Commission to Parliament and the Council by December 31, 2025, should include quantitative estimates of their contribution to the achievement of the Green Deal goals.

When preparing a proposal for the CAP beyond 2027, the European Commission should take into account the needs identified in the report:

• the need for assessment: which EU climate and environmental goals can be included in the quantified CAP targets and how;
• the need to clarify how these target levels will be used as criteria for evaluating member states’ CAP programming documents;
• The need to identify outcome indicators to monitor progress toward targets.