The renewed Common Agricultural Policy, which will come into effect in 2023, should contribute to a resilient, future-proof and smart agricultural sector. The climate, nature and the environment are themes that should be at the forefront of the new policy. What does the future-oriented agricultural sector look like according to the ministry? And what are the wishes from the farmer?
"As a highly productive, but at the same time small country, the Netherlands scores 'poorly' on points such as biodiversity and nitrogen. That is why it is necessary that our green-blue architecture is overhauled." This is what Aard Mulders (Ministry of Agriculture, Nature and Food Quality), Eefke Peeters (the Netherlands Enterprise Agency) and Jetze Genee (of the province of Friesland) say in the 'I'm in' conference about the new Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). "Society also demands something. We must take that into account, although the focus must be on what the farmer is best at: farming."
The European Commission is trying to focus on this in the new CAP, for example through eco schemes. These regulations can be completed freely for each country. "As the Netherlands, we must deal with this smartly. Farmers are not obliged to cooperate with this. It is up to us to make this step as accessible as possible. Farmers are motivated if they are allowed to decide for themselves which measures and how to apply these measures to the company," Peeters explains. "In short: don't punish for what goes wrong, but reward for what goes right. That's the motto."
Outline needs
In order to quickly and efficiently make the transition to future-proof agriculture, policy officials from the Ministry of Agriculture have described all threats in the sector. According to them, the most important thing is that the income on agricultural companies lags behind other sectors. This is partly because companies want to become more sustainable, but the high costs associated with this cannot be recovered from the market. They also describe that risks in the sector are increasing: from climate change and geopolitical tensions to price and market risks. "Many farmers see little or no future as a result. The percentage of farm owners under the age of 40 is already showing a decline every year."
Based on these threats, the ministry has drawn up the needs for a future-proof agricultural sector. At the top of the list is promoting a reasonable income (within the limits of sustainability) and, by extension, improving the financial position of farmers. In addition, more attention must be paid to developing the knowledge, skills and skills of farmers and more attention must be paid to innovations that have a higher added value.
What does the farmer want?
It is of course nice, all those analyzes from the Ministry of Agriculture. The key question, however, is: 'How do farmers envision future-proof agriculture?'. This question was also asked in the online conference. This has shown that the majority of agricultural entrepreneurs consider it important that there is an intrinsic drive among entrepreneurs. A lot of attention must also continue to be paid to family businesses, sustainability must be a top priority and more research must be done into the local marketing of products.
The government should mainly encourage the development of farmers' skills, strengthening the position of farmers in the chain and 'true pricing'. Promoting cooperation between a group of companies is also high on the list of farmers in future-oriented agriculture. The latter is underlined by Mulders: "After all, you want to work together to achieve the goals in your area." Farmers also believe that the largest part of the CAP budget should be spent on the basic payment per hectare, followed by eco-schemes and agricultural environmental, nature and landscape management.
It is striking that risk management, one of the needs that the ministry attaches great importance to, is not a priority for farmers for the future. "This is partly because you cannot remove all risks. For example, the weather cannot be influenced. And the insurance policies do not cover everything," said one of the participants. In short: although the vision for the future of the ministry and the farmer are quite similar, a striking difference is still visible. While the Ministry of Agriculture, in a future-proof sector, mainly focuses on the financial position of farmers, the farmer strives for the right position on a social level. "Appreciation from society does ensure a better financial position," it says.
This is the third article in the series about the new Common Agricultural Policy. In the fourth article, published on December 24, we zoom in on the challenges facing the sector. View all articles about the CAP here.