The Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), established in 1962, is one of the European Union’s oldest and most significant policies. It is the leading policy for transitioning the EU’s agricultural sector. However, this transition has faced considerable challenges.
CAP began incorporating environmental objectives in 1985, but its impact has been limited by political resistance from member states and agricultural groups. The WWF estimates that up to 60% of CAP funding—more than €30 billion annually—harms biodiversity. Furthermore, agriculture is the EU’s second-largest source of greenhouse gas emissions, accounting for 11%, higher than the industrial sector’s (9%). Indeed, 80% of CAP payments benefit less than 20% of recipients, mainly large farms practising conventional agriculture, which implements harmful practices exacerbating biodiversity loss through eutrophication, synthetic fertiliser use, and land degradation while contributing to methane emissions and climate change.
In response, the EU has launched an ambitious set of policies to drive environmental transition, in which agriculture plays a significant role, with the European Green Deal (EGD) at the forefront. The EGD aims for a climate-neutral Europe by 2050, reducing emissions by 50-55% from 1990 levels. The Farm to Fork (F2F) strategy declines the Deal for the agriculture sector. It targets a 50% reduction in pesticide use and antibiotics in livestock, a 20% reduction in synthetic fertilisers by 2030, and increasing organic farming from 10% to 25% of agricultural land. For the first time in history, the CAP has been designed to align with this set of policies.
The new Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) for 2021-2027 is presented as a significant shift in EU agricultural policy. With a total of €387 billion, it constitutes about 33% of the EU’s budget. This CAP is noteworthy for its increased alignment with EU environmental and climate-change policies through a green architecture. For the first time, 40% of the CAP budget will be climate-relevant. The structure is as follows:
- The first pillar – the European Agriculture Guarantee Fund – focuses on direct payments based on farm size rather than production levels. This approach is intended to prevent overproduction but induce a bias: historically, 80% of the smallest farms got only 30% of direct payments. To correct this, this new version plans 10% of direct payments to be allocated as a redistributive income support tool, aiming to increase payments to smaller farms. Additionally, the new CAP introduces voluntary “eco-schemes,” with 25% of the first pillar budget dedicated to these schemes. Ecoschemes provide funding and incentives for climate and environmentally friendly practices, and each member state tailors them. In addition, farmers receiving CAP support must also meet stricter conditionalities, including reinforced requirements for good agricultural and environmental practices such as crop rotation and diversification.
- The second pillar of the CAP – the European Agriculture Fund for Rural Development – pertains to indirect payments for rural development programs, such as agri-environmental measures, such as support for organic farming. A key stipulation is that at least 30% of funding for each Rural Development Program must be allocated to measures addressing environmental and climate change issues.
In addition, statutory management requirements apply to all farmers, regardless of CAP support. These requirements include EU regulations on public, animal, and plant health, animal welfare, and environmental standards, ensuring that all farmers comply with essential rules designed to protect health and the environment.
Pursuing the objectives of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) presents a complex challenge, as it must balance various societal needs and shifts.
Firstly, while sustainability is a crucial goal, the CAP must also address other critical objectives, such as food sovereignty and social justice. This multifaceted approach creates a complex policy structure that is difficult to implement, monitor and adhere to at the farm’s level.
Secondly, societal changes are necessary to meet CAP’s objectives. For instance, dietary shifts are needed to align with sustainability goals. In the EU, the consumption of livestock products significantly exceeds the recommendations of the World Health Organization (WHO), with animal protein intake being 70% higher than the guidelines.
Lastly, CAP cannot be reduced to a purely top-down policy due to the crucial role of political dynamics. The slow progress towards sustainable agriculture reflects this complexity. The political landscape is still hindering significant shifts, as evidenced by recent farmer protests in several EU countries at the beginning of 2024. Although the spectrum of revendications was broad, it has led the EU institutions to reconsider some measures and reduce environmental ambitions. For example, the requirement to dedicate at least 4% of arable land to non-productive features, such as fallow land, was discarded. Therefore, in the end, this new CAP brought only marginal changes by limiting conditionalities to the least constraining, confining strong pro-environmental and pro-climate actions to voluntary schemes, and keeping the direct payment model mainly proportional to farm size.
