Agriculture/rural development policy

Dr Javier Martínez Vassallo

Changes in support for livestock production introduced under the reform of the CAP have profoundly affected the linkage between production activity and support. Support has largely been de-coupled from output but a set of quotas and other conditions now limit the eligibility to support and may inhibit the ability of farmers to expand or intensify production. Structural funding itself is being applied to Objective 1 and 5(b) areas, with new arrangements to encourage the supply of benefits to the rural economy, through improvements in farm structure and efficiency. Underlying these changes is a move towards harmonization of agricultural activity with other land use objectives; in a post-productivist era, integrating output-orientated production with stewardship and maintenance of the environment. The interrelationship between agri-environmental measures and other changes in market and structured support is a central determinant of how farming systems will develop.

This sub-group is made up of policy researchers and interested governmental bodies, eg. European Commission, the national agricultural ministries etc. engaged in the study of the responses of livestock farmers to CAP reform, structural and environmental measures.

· This sub-group will assess the multi-functional and changing role of policy measures to support livestock farming in LFAs and disadvantaged areas. There is a need to characterise the changing environmental role of livestock farming, the need to stimulate the development of local markets for value-added livestock output, and the continuing requirement to support local incomes and employment. The group will focus on the interaction between the types of support measures, and particularly direct payments and constraints on these payments, and the development of new roles for livestock producers and new forms of production.

· One important output of the group's activities will be to collate information on the way livestock farms and systems are responding to CAP reform measures and what these measures imply for the stewardship role of LFA farmers, the supply of output to local markets and the local economic impact of agricultural activity. It will be an important function of the group to assess whether current support measures provide the right stimulus to innovation and allow flexibility to adapt livestock farming systems to meet new objectives. There will be strong linkage between the policy development/policy response focus of this group and the livestock systems, product processing and environmental concerns of the other groups in the partnership.

· The dissemination of the impact of policy measures to other subgroups.