In the European Agriculture Council on Monday, ministers representing each of the EU's member states were briefed on the progress of trilogue CAP negotiations. The Common Agricultural Policy reform debates entered their final stage in April following Council voting in March, and current Council president, Ireland's minister for food and agriculture Simon Coveney, believes a deal will be struck before Ireland's presidency of the EU is over in June.

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Although ministers lent support to Coveney's hopeful assertion that agreements will be reached between the three EU legislative bodies by the end of next month, opinions within the council remained split over key issues this week.

Debates in the Agriculture Council focused on three contentious areas of the policy reforms currently under discussion between members of the Council, Parliament and executive Commission, which initially proposed the reforms. These included organising direct payments for active farmers, the young farmers' scheme and the small farmers' scheme.

The "outstanding issues," which Council members said had been raised over the course of twelve trilogue negotiations held since the CAP reform process entered its final phase last month, included establishing the definition of an 'active farmer', which will be necessary to tighten direct payments allocations under the reformed CAP.

Coveney sought ministers' views on creating a 'negative list' of businesses or claimants that could be excluded under the reformed scheme. Negative lists compiled by individual states would give details of potential beneficiaries that do not meet enough requirements to be considered 'active farmers'. However, opinion between ministers was divided, with some supporting Coveney's calls for a list while others opposed such mandatory measures.

Similarly divergent views were expressed over whether to make support for young farmers and small farmers voluntary or mandatory, though, according to a Council statement released after the event, "a number of member states pointed out their willingness to stay open for possible flexibility on these issues."

Although the Council did reach an incomplete agreement on CAP reform in late March, the representatives of Slovakia and Slovenia stood aside, refusing to sign a compromise they said would see their countries treated unfairly. Nevertheless, Simon Coveney said the support of the overwhelming majority of ministers constituted a strong position for the entry into trilogue negotiations.

There are 22 more trilogue negotiations planned before 20th June, over the course of which representatives of the three EU bodies are forecast to establish a rough framework for reforms.