Charlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy for her question. The aim of the CAP is to all support farmers across the community to continue to produce top quality and sustainable food. The redistributive mechanisms currently in place under pillar I of the CAP seek to create a more even payment landscape and target funds where they are needed most. These redistributive mechanisms comprise a core EU policy and are set to continue into the new CAP from 2023. The development of Ireland's CSP involves several stages, including a strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats, SWOT, analysis, in addition to a needs assessment, intervention design, financial allocations, target setting and governance systems. The draft CSP will be subject to an ex anteevaluation, strategic environmental assessment and appropriate assessment, including public consultation on the draft CSP and draft environmental report.

I continue to engage extensively with stakeholders on the future of CAP. Consultations on the development of the CSP will continue via the CAP consultative committee, which comprises representatives of the main stakeholders including farm bodies, NGOs, industry representatives and academia. This committee has met on 18 occasions and further meetings are planned.

The Presidency compromise package includes a suite of measures which will enable us to ensure the fair implementation of redistribution measures such as capping, convergence and complementary redistribution of income support for sustainability, CRISS, as it is known. The agreement strikes the right balance between ensuring a fair distribution of payments between farmers and achieving a higher level of environmental and climate ambition. It also provides member states with the flexibility required to implement the CAP in a way that best suits their national circumstances. This flexibility was one of my key objectives from the outset.

While agreement has been reached, further work remains on certain technical details of the proposed reforms. I expect to shortly bring a memo to Government and launch a public consultation on the draft interventions proposed for the CAP Strategic Plan. I will also continue to engage with stakeholders as we develop our CAP strategic plan 2023-2027.

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