Irish Regions Office Website

April 24, 2009

Less Favoured Areas criteria

The European Commission has published (21 April) a Communication, 'Towards a better targeting of the aid to farmers in areas with natural handicaps'which focuses on modifications to the existing rural development support scheme to Less Favoured Areas (LFAs). Following efforts in 2005 to better focus the thirty year-old scheme towards land management objectives, especially on areas where the threat of flight from the land is most pronounced, Agriculture Ministers were unable to agree on a common LFA classification - specifically the grey area of an "intermediate zone'' - and the Commission was charged with bringing forward recommendations for the scheme's modification by 2010.

This Communication proposes a new 'biophysical' criterion based on 8 soil productivity and climate criteria rather than socio-economic disadvantage factors and asks Member States to contribute towards the legislative process
by carrying out national projections on this basis. The data and 'simulation' maps, which are to consider eligibility rules at the level of individual farms in order to "exclude areas where agriculture has overcome these handicaps" are to be submitted to the Commission within six months and must include "elements to ensure that areas where natural handicaps have been offset are not eligible". Currently, 77% of Irish agricultural land is classified as part of an LFA. The new system would apply from 2014.
http://ec.europa.eu/agriculture/rurdev/lfa/comm/index_en.htm

Posted by iroronan at April 24, 2009 05:26 PM