Food for Thought

For the past two or three years it has been possible to find out details of farmers' support payments under the Freedom of Information Act.

It is an issue that gets many farmers hot under the collar - although others do argue that as an industry we have nothing to hide so we shouldn't act like we do.

But this kind of information is about to get even more accessible. All recipients of European Union agricultural and rural development payments will be published in detail under new rules adopted by the European Commission this week.

By 30 April, 2009, the full name, municipality and, where available, postal code of every recipient will be published in a clear, harmonised manner on nationally-managed websites.

A search tool will enable the public to see how much money each person or company has received. Amounts will be broken down in direct payments to farmers and other support measures.

"This is taxpayers' money, so it is very important that people know where it is being spent," said Mariann Fischer Boel, Commissioner for Agriculture and Rural Development.

"Transparency should also improve the management of these funds, by reinforcing public control of how the money is used. Only in this way can we guarantee an informed debate about the future of the Common Agricultural Policy. This level of transparency is something both we and the European Parliament have been pushing for and we're glad we now have agreement on how the system will work."

The Welsh Assembly Government has revealed that it is ready to issue single farm payments to 75% of farmers in Wales on 3 December.

It is great news for them (unless you are one of the unlucky 25%), but sadly farmers in England are facing an all too familiar scenario.

For the best that DEFRA and the Rural Payments Agency have so far come up with is to say that it aims to have completed 75% of the value of payments by the end of March 2008.

And instead of making getting payments out a priority, DEFRA seems to be getting sidetracked by issues such as cost-cutting and talking about giving golden handshakes to DEFRA officials of up to £150K.

Today's story in The Independent about a possible subsidy cap wasn't new news (FW reported it back in September). The way the paper handled it was also pretty predictable - featuring the usual collection of Royals and Dukes (excuse me while I yawn).

But it is not all bad news. The story has generated some interesting discussion about the purpose of support payments and whether a cap would really be such a bad thing on the FWiSpace discussion forums.

Farmers Weekly’s sister magazine Poultry World once appeared on the legendary TV show Have I Got News For You as part of the guest publication round. I’m led to believe that the star headline was "Slim chicks lay better", which went down very well with the audience, for some reason.

This has got me thinking about how some of the headlines in FW could be interpreted if given the HIGNFY treatment. How about this one from a 1985 issue?

'Captive bolt – no better way to die'

Personally, I’ve always fancied going in my sleep…

9.30am
I'm optimistic as we sit down to start this year's SP5 form. It's the third year of doing it - so it must get easier - and Dad informs me that he hasn't "many" split fields this year which is what normally causes us a headache. It makes a pleasant change as he normally likes to distribute bits of set-aside around the place which require us to draw endless sketch maps and argue about how big each bit really is.

9.39am

I notice something interesting. It can't be a co-incidence that the average farmer is in his late 50s and the size of the print in the SP5 guidance book is getting bigger? In ten year's time will the form come with a free magnifying glass?

10.16am

We've just spent half an hour checking of all the different field parcels to see if the pre-populated form is right. They all seem to be there but I'm perplexed by the crop codes that have been put in column C8. They seem to be based on the 2006 crop codes but they suggest the RPA already knows what the land is being used for in 2007. Do we actually need to be filling in this thing at all?

11.15am

It now transpires there seems to be just as many split fields as normal. We have one field data sheet where we seem to have deleted practically every entry because they need to be entered on a blank sheet. I think the measuring wheel is going to be needed very soon...

11.30am

Had a fifteen minute hunt for the contract for the industrial set-aside. Eventually located in a stray file. Panic over.

11.45am

We've completed most of the field data sheet and miraculously most of the pre-populated entries seem to be right. Perhaps the RPA is finally getting its act together? In some ways though, the fact that the pre-populated entries are right, makes it more confusing. Because we're not actually writing anything on some lines it is easy to loose track of which ones you have done and which ones you haven't.

12.00pm

Back to the boredom of drawing sketch maps, but I am diverting myself by eating the sweet and chocolate supplies. We have a choice of wine gums, rhubarb and custards or Roses.

12.30pm

We're really starting to motor now - if I am honest this seems significantly more straightforward than last year. Or do I speak too soon? We haven't tackled Part E yet and I remember that causing us big problems 12 months ago. One to try after lunch.

What are the top three words guaranteed to set farmers' blood boiling?

How about Rural Payments Agency, writes deputy business editor Ian Ashbridge.

No-one in farming will need reminding of how big a shambles the administration of the Single Payment System has proved. At a cost of something like £22m in interest and finance charges, it will be hard to forget.

Remember Major Major's father in Joseph Heller's magnificent Catch 22? The more government support he received not to grow alfalfa, the more alfalfa he didn't grow and the richer he became. I was reminded of that reading an article in The Times today "EU loophole allows city "farmers" to reap millions in subsidy harvest."
It alleges people who live in cities are making vast profits out of an EU loophole which allows them to claim farm support without owning land or going nearer a farm than watching the TV show Emerdale.

Things must be bad at the Rural Payments Agency. I’ve just found out that the main press officer has decamped to the Home Office – talk about out of the frying pan into the fire!

The good news is that he has already been replaced and the new guy has had a lucky break in that the agency actually has something positive to say for once. It turns out that close to 22,000 farmers have now received a full 2006 single farm payment and more are on the way.

We've taken two calls in the office from people who have been paid their 2006 single farm payment and I couldn't be more pleased for them.

Yet we can't escape from the fact that there are still plenty of people who haven't had their 2005 payments finalised.

There aren't that many who haven't had anything (and even with the old IACS scheme there were always some people the Rural Payments Agency couldn't pay for months and months). But there are 620 waiting for a top-up payment and another 20,000 with an error.

Admittedly, some of the 20,000 will be people who were overpaid rather than underpaid but it is still pretty depressing.

My prediction is that the partial payments for 2006 will go out pretty much as promised by government (that's starting in mid-Feb for those who have forgotten!). But I reckon the number of errors will be huge and the whole mess will take just as long to sort out as for the 2005 claim year.