Half of Andalusian farmers and ranchers could lose funds under the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food’s proposed national strategic plan to implement the Common Agricultural Policy, a local senior official has warned.
“Fifty-three percent of Andalusian farmers and ranchers are going to lose funds with the Common Agricultural Policy proposed by the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food,” Carmen Crespo, the Andalusian Minister of Agriculture, Livestock, Fisheries and Sustainable Development, told the autonomous community’s parliament.
See Also:European Parliament Approves CAP Reform Amid Strong OppositionCrespo warned against the adoption of the proposed CAP, which would come into force in 2023 and run through 2027, during a question and answer session to address the regional government’s concerns about the federal government’s strategic plan.
“There is no good CAP for Spain if it is not good for our region,” Crespo said.
She added that farmers of rainfed herbaceous crops, which cover 750,000 hectares in the autonomous community, would lose between 30 and 45-percent of their funding.
On the other hand, farmers of irrigated herbaceous crops may see their funding fall between 25 and 50 percent.
Additionally, 700,000 hectares of olive groves in Andalusia – slightly less than half of the autonomous community’s total – risk losing funding. Although, only one percent of Spanish olive farmers are expected to lose funding under the proposed national strategic plan.
Crespo also warned that the ecoscheme models proposed in the current plan would mean that 40 percent of Andalusian farmers and ranchers would lose between 10 and 50 percent of their funding.
The ecoschemes are a new component of the CAP. They are meant to comprise 25 percent of each country’s strategic plan and reward farmers for converting to organic agriculture and other environmentally friendly practices.
Instead, Crespo called on the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food to consider the 12 ecoschemes proposed by Andalusian authorities, which she argued would be more representative of Andalusian agriculture and would mean fewer farmers lose funding.
Crespo finished by reminding the session that Andalusia’s agricultural sector “has given its heart by supplying the markets of half the world during the Covid-19 pandemic.”
According to the Andalusian minister, the autonomous community’s agri-food exports had exceeded €10 billion in the first 10 months in 2021, a record-high figure and an 8.4‑percent increase compared to 2020.
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