EU - Political agreement on new CAP: fairer, greener, more flexible

A fairer CAP

• For the first time, the CAP will include social conditionality, meaning that CAP beneficiaries will have to respect elements of European social and labour law to receive CAP funds.
• Redistribution of income support will be mandatory. Member States will redistribute at least 10% to the benefit of smaller farms, and must describe in their strategic plan how they plan to do this.
• Support for young farmers will have a new mandatory minimum level of 3% of Member States' budgets for CAP income support to young farmers (farmers up to 40). This could cover income support, investment or start-up aid for young farmers.

A greener CAP

The new CAP will support the transition towards more sustainable agriculture with increased ambition for climate, environment, and animal welfare.

• Consistency with the European Green Deal: The new CAP will fully integrate EU environmental and climate legislation. CAP Plans will contribute to the targets of the Farm to Fork and Biodiversity Strategies, and will be updated to take into account the changes in the climate and environmental legislation from the European Green Deal.
• Conditionality: the minimum requirements CAP beneficiaries have to comply with to receive support are now more ambitious. For example, on every farm at least 3% of arable land will be dedicated to biodiversity and non-productive elements, with a possibility to receive a support via ecoschemes to achieve 7% . All wetlands and peatlands will be protected.
• Ecoschemes will be mandatory for Member States to offer. This new voluntary instrument will reward farmers for implementing climate and environmentally-friendly practices (organic farming, agroecology, integrated pest management, etc.) as well as animal welfare improvements. Member States must allocate at least 25% of their income support budget to ecoschemes, a total of €48 billion of the direct payments budget.
• At least 35% of rural development funds will be allocated to agri-environment commitments, which promote environmental, climate and animal welfare practices.
• The CAP budget must contribute significantly to the Union's overall climate spending. To ensure a realistic and robust calculation, by 2025 the Commission will propose a new, differentiated approach that moves beyond the existing methods.

A more flexible CAP

The new CAP introduces a new way of working, where each Member State will draft a national CAP strategic plan describing how the CAP objectives as well as and Green Deal objectives as described in the Farm to Fork and Biodiversity Strategies will be achieved.

In addition, the new CAP focuses on performance thanks to:

• Simpler rules at EU level.
• An annual performance report to be submitted by Member States to the Commission from 2024 onwards, complemented by an annual review meeting.
• The Commission will review the performance of the CAP strategic plans in 2025 and 2027, to be followed up, when necessary, by a request for action to Member States by the Commission.
• A set of common indicators to monitor the implementation of the CAP and assess the performance of CAP strategic plans.

Strengthening the position of farmers in a competitive agri-food sector

• The new CAP maintains an overall market orientation, with EU farms operating according to market signals while taking advantage of opportunities outside the EU resulting from trade.
• It also reinforces the position of farmers in the food supply chain by expanding the possibilities for farmers to join forces, including by means of certain exceptions from competition law.
• A new agricultural reserve will be introduced to fund market measures in times of crises, with an annual budget of at least €450 million.