We can't make it more fun, but more difficult

Just like the tax return, the Combined Statement - popularly known as the May count - is not at the top of the list of favorite jobs for most farmers. With a little common sense, an advisor or possibly with the help of the RVO helpdesk, it was always possible to get the plots, crops and other data correctly into the government's system. However, the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) is going to be overhauled this year and with that the entire system of the Combined Task will also be turned upside down.

Government ICT systems are generally not known as the most user-friendly, but RVO's 'My parcels' module proved to be a very workable system for most farmers. You enter the cultivated area, the main crop, any green manure, field edge, phosphate status, don't forget the correct check marks and Kees was done. Was Kees, because this season non-productive areas can/should also be introduced. Together with the mandatory buffer strips and the so-called conditionalities, good agricultural and environmental conditions (GAEC), it has certainly not become any easier.

We already received a first sign that things were going to be less easy this season with the BGT check (Basic Registration Large-scale Topography). The RVO had re-established the field boundaries and every farmer was invited to check them and report errors if necessary. There were quite a few errors in this on my own farm and I have spoken to very few colleagues who did not find errors in the BGT. We had to report those errors in time, because the new borders form the basis for the May count. However, the standard response from RVO was something along the lines of 'draw the correct boundaries in the next Combined Exercise'. Why then the BGT check?

Crop-free zones have caused quite a stir
It was known that a lot was going to change this season. Providing some clarity about this in time by the Ministry of Agriculture has not been entirely successful, to put it mildly. The winter wheat and tulips were already in the ground at many farmers before it was clear about the crop-free zones. Those cultivation-free zones that were registered in January in the 'My plots' module have already caused quite a stir. In theory it is not very difficult. The basis is a crop-free zone of three metres. If such a strip takes up more than 4% of the plot, it may be reduced to half a meter in the end. However, there are many exceptions to the main rule. The cultivation-free zone is always one meter along a dry ditch, along the Water Framework Directive (WFD) watercourses the buffer strip is five meters, which can possibly be narrowed by the 4% rule, and the buffer strip is always five meters in ecologically vulnerable watercourses. Apart from that, the Activities Decree is still in force.

A practical example: On a plot of 100 meters wide with a water-carrying ditch on both sides, a crop-free zone of 1 meter may be maintained on the basis of the CAP. A ditch on the headlands is left out of consideration for the sake of simplicity. If the plot is 40 meters wide, the crop-free zone may be reduced to 0,5 metres. For example, if potatoes are planted or onions are sown on this small plot, and the farmer in question has a sprayer with 90% drift-reducing nozzles, he must adhere to the 1 meter wide crop-free zone from the activities decree and not the 0,5 meter from the CAP. No 90% drift reduction? Then it will be 1,5 meters. That is actually what we have been accustomed to in recent years.

It gets crazy with the dry locks
It gets crazy with dry ditches where there is no water from April 1 to October 1. The Activities Decree does not require a cultivation-free zone there, but in the new situation a mandatory buffer zone of 1 meter is required. The 4% rule does not apply here. Suppose the small plot in the example has a dry ditch on one side and an aquifer on the other. With wheat, you must then leave 1 meter along the dry ditch and only 0,5 meters along the water-carrying ditch (where the chance of leaching into the surface water is logically greater).

In short; the rules have not become more logical and certainly not simpler. It takes time to find out everything and calculate it back to your own company. But if you sit down for it, it's largely doable. It only becomes really difficult if you want to sign it up with RVO. Entirely in line with this time, the RVO has filled the site with videos and infographics about how to draw buffer strips and landscape elements, for example. Indicating which button to click succeeds in the videos, but that's where it ends. Where the limits of the BGT are not correct, you can make a new limit. But try again to get the right buffer strip past it. Not to mention drawing in landscape elements with the correct crop code. And what do you do if both a water-carrying ditch and a dry ditch are shown on the map or if ditches in a meadow are drawn as ditches?

Minor adjustment from silver to gold
It is not surprising that some of the farmers just wait it out. Others have started puzzling with it, but I hear from many colleagues that you can't figure it out without telephone help from RVO. That's also my experience, by the way. The employees of RVO are generally friendly and try to help as best they can. Nor do they have a ready-made answer to everything, and questions from farmers also reveal loose ends in the guidelines for which policy still needs to be made.

Now the deadline for completing the May census is still a few months away. However, a correctly completed 'My parcels' is required to do a simulation at farm level with the new CAP. That is the first step, RVO writes on the site. With minor adjustments, it may still be possible to qualify for the hectare premium or to go from silver to gold. The late availability of the simulation tool - with, if I have understood correctly, not all functionalities yet - is another story. If, as a farmer, you still have to/want to make changes to the cultivation plan for the CAP, time is running out.

Keep administrative hassle to a minimum
Last year the doomsday picture at the ministry was that due to the many rules and a lower compensation compared to the old CAP, part of the farmers dropped out of participating in the CAP. If that happened, the ministry would lose an important instrument to steer the sector. I have heard that several times at RVO. Then you think that the ministry is doing everything possible to keep the preconditions as simple as possible. And to keep the administrative hassle to a minimum in order to keep the threshold on that side as low as possible for entrepreneurs. But maybe that's too simplistic. Where the tax authorities used the slogan 'we can't make it more fun, but easier' for years, RVO is allowed to adopt the slogan: 'We can't make it more fun, but more difficult'.

Jurphaas Lugtenburg

Jurphaas Lugtenburg is editor at Boerenbusiness and focuses mainly on the arable farming sectors and the feed and energy market. Jurphaas also owns a small arable farm in Voorne-Putten (South Holland).

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