Brussels adopts waiver on uncultivated CAP land through 2024

Brussels – European farmers will not have to set aside 4 per cent of their arable land through 2024. After having put forward the proposal and consulted governments, the European Commission today (Feb. 13) officially adopted a regulation to grant farmers through 2024 a “partial exemption” from the Common Agricultural Policy’s (CAP) fallow land cross-compliance rule.

The waiver was urgently granted to farmers for 2022 and then for 2023, following the Russian invasion of Ukraine that tested EU food security. Last Jan. 31, the European Commission proposed its extension for the entire year in response to protests by European farmers who are demonstrating across Europe against high agricultural fuel prices and overly stringent environmental policies.

The exemptions will be in effect starting tomorrow but will apply retroactively from Jan. 1 for one year or until Dec. 31, 2024. Instead of keeping land fallow or maintaining unproductive elements on 4 per cent of their arable land, EU farmers who grow nitrogen-fixing crops (such as lentils, peas or field beans) and/or catch crops without plant protection products on 4 per cent of their arable land will be considered to equally meet the requirements of the CAP (GAEC 8).

Member states wishing to apply the derogation at the national level need only notify the European Commission within 15 days of the regulation’s entry into force so that farmers can be informed as soon as possible. “Only if our farmers can live off their land they will invest in the future. Only if we achieve our climate and environmental goals together will farmers be able to continue living. Our farmers know this well,” commented European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, assuring that the European executive will soon come up with “more proposals to help alleviate the pressure our farmers face.”

“Despite the improvements made compared to the initial proposal, the measure of the commission does not respond to the needs of Italian farmers,” commented the President of Confagricoltura, Massimiliano Giansanti, on the regulation published today in the Official Journal of the EU on the derogation from the obligation to maintain uncultivated or unproductive part of agricultural land. “The commission has included an excessive list of conditions, which significantly reduce the measure’s effectiveness. This is also demonstrated by the Italian delegation’s vote against it,” Giansanti continued. “Our goal is to remove the obligation of non-productive land use from the current CAP legislation, but a legislative proposal from the commission is needed, which would be impossible to approve before the end of the European legislature.

That is why a regulatory measure was necessary, but it is yielding unsatisfactory results. “For our part, however, we are not giving up on improving the situation for Italian farmers. To this end,” concludes the President of Confagricoltura, “we will make our proposals to the commission in view of the presentation of the ‘package’ on simplification that will be ready for the meeting of the Agriculture Council scheduled for February 26, in Brussels.”