|
The Institute for European Environmental Policy (IEEP) has
published a report attempting to identify, for the first time,
the full range of environmental and wider societal benefits
arising from European farming.
The report - The Provision of Public Goods through Agriculture
in the European Union - concludes that many of these benefits
- including the maintenance of high quality water and soils,
cultural landscapes and biodiversity habitats - are found
to be highly valued, but are already not being provided on
a sufficient scale (a situation likely to further deteriorate
in the future with technological change and the threats of
climate change impact and commodity price instability upon
farming).
Instigated on behalf of the Commission's DG Agriculture
and Rural Development, the IEEP
report sets out the arguments for increased public intervention
in the delivery of such goods and services.
It argues that this can best be achieved through appropriately
targeted Common Agricultural Policy measures, whereby direct
payments are - as now - tied into standards compliance based
on environmental factors such as maintaining the condition
of land.
The publication comes at a time when the debate about the
size and character of the CAP beyond 2013 is intensifying.
To download the report - Click
Here
|
