FARMERS ARE being offered the chance to help shape the remit and future role of all the UK and GB levy bodies. 

A broad ranging review of the five national levy bodies is due to be completed by the end of October 2005 with farmers urged to register their opinion by the end of July.

The bodies up for review are:

• the British Potato Council;
• the Home Grown Cereals Authority;
• the Horticultural Development Council;
• the Meat and Livestock Commission; and
• the Milk Development Council.

The review follows a recommendation from Lord Haskins in December 2003 who said their roles and structures should be reviewed to encompass recent changes to the CAP and a changing role for agriculture in the UK.

Mrs Radcliffe said:  “I shall be examining the rationale, role, organisation, funding and functions of the levy bodies, and in doing so I shall want to ensure that my report and recommendations take full account of likely future developments in the agriculture and horticulture sectors, especially following CAP reform, and the implications in terms of the needs of these sectors.

“I want to hear the views of all key stakeholders on these important issues and am having discussions with the levy bodies themselves, the farming unions, trade associations and other bodies with an interest in these matters, but I am particularly interested in hearing the views of those who currently pay levies to the boards.”

Levy payers who wish to make comments on the role of levy bodies in their sector; the role that the levy boards have played in the past and how effective they have been and the role they might play in the future, should write to:

Rosemary Radcliffe
Levy Bodies Review,
Area 5E Millbank,
Nobel House,
17, Smith Square
London. 
SW1P  3JR

Alternatively respondents can e-mail their comments to: levyreviewcomments@defra.gsi.gov.uk