Michael Creed (Cork North West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

A delegated Act has been recently adopted by the EU Commission which proposes 14 changes pertaining to the basic payment and greening schemes. This Act is currently with the European Parliament for review. This legislative process was commenced to try to reduce the complexity of regulations for farmers and to make schemes less bureaucratic and more streamlined to administer.

As part of this Act the Commission has introduced a proposal to ban the use of plant-protection products on ecological focus areas. In Ireland this proposed ban would relate to land lying fallow, catch crops and nitrogen-fixing crops. This ban has been opposed by Ireland along with 18 other member states.

For my Department, the main concern relates to nitrogen-fixing crops and specifically beans, a substantial number of which are grown in the Deputy's constituency. In effect, the proposed ban would make it more difficult for growers to produce an economically viable crop of beans. In addition, farmers growing beans but not using beans as part of their ecological focus area would not be subject to this proposed ban. Potentially we could therefore have two standards for growing the crop within the State with attendant issues relating to scheme controls.

Fundamentally, the simplification process was not intended to place an increased burden on farmers and administrators. My Department's view is that this proposal would lead to such an increased burden.

It is important to clarify that the current cross-compliance rules that relate to the use of plant-protection products ensure that such products are used correctly on all crops. My Department ensures compliance with these regulations by means of regular notifications to farmers, such as the recently published cross-compliance booklet, and by means of on-farm inspection.

See this speech in context