BBC News, 26
June 2013
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Stories
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French farmers, like this one in Laqueuille, typically have smaller holdings than in the UK |
Ministers
reached a deal with Euro MPs and the European Commission.
However,
environmentalists say many of the green measures in the original proposals have
been swept away.
The Common
Agricultural Policy (CAP) and rural development payments account for nearly 40%
of the EU's long-term budget.
The plan is
to spend about 50bn euros (£42bn; $65bn) annually on agriculture in 2014-2020.
Under the
deal reached on Wednesday, some of the money withheld from big industrial farms
will be redistributed to smaller farms, with an emphasis on those that use
eco-friendly methods.
Sugar
shortages
The deal
still has to be approved by EU governments and the European parliament.
Officials
are confident that that will happen, because ministers and parliamentarians
have been involved in the negotiating process, says the BBC's Europe
correspondent Chris Morris, in Brussels.
Negotiators
also agreed to end EU sugar production quotas which critics say have distorted
the market for years, and created artificial shortages.
The
definition of an "active farmer" has also been contentious. The
current payments system is largely based on land area and past subsidy levels,
meaning that landowners like airports and sports clubs, which do not farm, have
been getting subsidies on the basis of their grasslands or other eligible land
areas.
The
ministers have agreed on a "short mandatory negative list comprising
airports, railway services, waterworks, real estate services and permanent
sports and recreational grounds".
Our
correspondent says the UK agriculture minister abstained in voting on one of
four new regulations, arguing that some member states wanted to go back to the
days of butter mountains and wine lakes.
In the
1970s and 80s the CAP took up a bigger share of the EU budget because there
were more subsidies for farmers simply to produce. That led to wasteful
overproduction.
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