CAP Reform: EPP Group gets more flexibility for farmers

EPP Group putting pressure on European Commission to improve implementation of CAP reform/More flexibility for farmers

The European Commission is willing, following pressure from the EPP Group in the European Parliament, to grant more flexibility to farmers on the implementation of the reform of the EU's Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). The European Commissioner for Agriculture, Dacian Cioloş, gave corresponding assurances to the EPP Group's Coordinator in the European Parliament's Agriculture Committee, stating that the European Commission will add an interpretation note to the implementing provisions of the CAP reform (known as ‘delegated acts’).

"I have been assured by the European Commission that the weighting factor for protein plants and multi-annual energy crops will be corrected substantially, allowing for protein plants such as field beans or clover to be cultivated in priority areas, in line with the EU's protein strategy. Cultivating such energy crops can also contribute to meeting Europe's energy needs. The proposals for the recognition of landscape elements, which were heavily criticised at the last meeting of the European Parliament's Agriculture Committee, are also to be changed so that they can be more easily implemented", Albert Dess MEP said.

"The European Commission must now submit its texts in order to give us the certainty that these changes will come into force at the beginning of 2015, thus allowing for the approval of the delegated acts", Dess concluded.