Mary Coughlan (Donegal South West, Fianna Fail)

Farmers receiving direct aid are required under the single payment scheme to respect the various statutory management requirements set down in EU legislation on the environment, food safety, animal health and welfare, and plant health, and to maintain the farm in good agricultural and environmental condition. Member states are obliged to ensure that there is no significant reduction in the amount of land under permanent pasture by reference to the total area under permanent pasture in 2003. These requirements are termed "cross-compliance".

In addition to cross-compliance checks, it is a requirement to carry out standard eligibility checks to verify that the actual area claimed in the single payment application form corresponds with the area held by the farmer and to ensure that there are no overlapping or duplication of parcels claimed.

In general the rate of on-farm inspection required for cross-compliance under the single payment scheme is 1% of those farmers to whom the relevant statutory management requirement or good agricultural and environmental conditions apply. However, at least 5% of producers must be inspected under the animal identification and registration requirements as this level is prescribed under the relevant regulations.

In October 2004 the Department prepared a consultative document on cross-compliance and invited views from interested organisations. Department officials met the main farming organisations in December to discuss their submissions and these discussions have continued more recently in the context of the review of the protocol on direct payments.

An information booklet on cross-compliance has been issued to all farmers. It sets out the principal features of cross-compliance in terms of the standards that must be met by farmers and the control arrangements that will be necessary. To coincide with the issue of the booklet, a series of countrywide farmer information meetings organised by my Department in conjunction with Teagasc took place in early April. These meetings focused not only on cross-compliance but addressed the various other issues associated with the introduction of the single payment scheme.

The EU directives and regulations referred to in cross-compliance have been in place for many years. Producers are generally familiar with them and are complying with the standards set in implementing them in Ireland.

In implementing the single payment scheme, I am aiming to minimise the number of inspection visits and to move towards a position where, in most cases, all eligibility and cross-compliance checks will be carried out during a single farm visit. It is envisaged that the 22,000 or so inspections, which were carried out under the old regime, will be significantly reduced to 10,000 under the single payment scheme. This approach should minimise the level of inconvenience to farmers. However, in certain instances more than one inspection of a holding may be unavoidable.

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