Although senior members of the EU's three legislative bodies are this week celebrating the newly finalised CAP deal, which was welcomed by farm lobbyists on Tuesday, the package has been condemned by both conservative and green MEPs. The Greens warn that the new Common Agricultural Policy is too 'flexible' to provide the environmental and social protection promised by the Committee and Council.

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On 30th September, the full EU Parliament, playing an equal role in the reform process for the first time, will vote on the controversial policy changes agreed over the course of trilogue negotiations which have taken place since late June, when the broader points of CAP reform were established. A Parliamentary delegation has taken part in negotiations with the Council and Commission up until now.

Reacting to the agreements reached on Tuesday, when participants in the final trilogue meeting declared that the reform process had been concluded, Green MEP José Bové said the agreed position is much worse than the one voted on by the Parliament earlier in the year, and will fail to provide for the fundamental reform the CAP needs. He accused negotiators of removing the 'common' from the Common Agricultural Policy.

Bové said, "Last night's deal… represents a massive missed opportunity for overhauling the EU's agriculture policy. The outcome of this legislation will fail to provide for a fairer distribution of agricultural funds and will not deliver for the environment. EU governments have pressured MEPs into accepting a deal at any cost and, as a consequence, have passed up the opportunity to make the CAP fit for the 21st Century."

Echoing earlier criticisms, the Greens maintain that the Council of ministers refused to discuss budget-related issues before a deal had been agreed on the Multi-annual Financial Framework (the EU's long-term budget). This, they claim, delayed the reform process and led to the frantic last minute pushes to strike deals seen before the end of the Irish EU presidency in June and the full Parliamentary vote on Monday (30th Sept), in order for direct payments to farmers to continue.

M Bové, a French farmer and activist of some renown, agreeing for once with one of the most persistent criticisms of industry lobbyists and right wing politicians, also took aim at proposals to make 15 percent of CAP funds transferable between the two pillars. Although in the UK the NFU opposes the policy because the government is likely to shift money from direct payments (Pillar One) into the rural development pot (Pillar Two), elsewhere governments are expected to do the opposite, potentially jeopardising environmental protection delivered through agri-environment schemes funded under the second pillar.

Bové continued, "The final agreement abandons the proposed capping of direct payments to farmers. Huge farming businesses which do not need the funding will continue to get big pay-cheques, whilst depriving other sustainable areas of the CAP from funding. This flies in the face of small farmers' and citizens' interests.

"The rules for 'greening' the CAP are riddled with exemptions, so they will fail to truly make EU agriculture sustainable, as they will not be implemented on the vast majority of farms. Instead of real crop rotation with legumes, which is a win-win-win for the environment, soil fertility and lowering farmers' costly dependency on chemicals, the CAP will promote weaker crop 'diversification' on a minority of farms. An important loophole is the failure to prevent the use of pesticides and fertilisers on so-called Ecological Focus Areas (EFA), meaning a farmer could grow a monoculture of genetically-modified soya and use pesticides and still declare this as an EFA. This is clearly unacceptable and we await clarification through the delegated acts the Commission is currently drafting." 

NFU Director of Policy Martin Haworth said on Wednesday that "While [NFU] think this reform has missed an opportunity to become more common, more simple and more market oriented we do welcome the fact that the Council and the European Parliament have resolved their differences and reached a final agreement." Also referencing the controversial modulation between CAP pillars, he called on Defra to ensure that that in the UK reforms are applied in such a way that "farmers to compete fairly with their European counterparts."

Although MEPs are believed to have attempted to reign in the 'modulation' aspect of the reformed CAP, their counterparts in the Council stood firm and would only accept moves to increase the level of matched funding for rural development in less-developed and peripheral regions and the Aegean islands.

Although parliamentarians who had been involved in the trilogue negotiations appeared outwardly to be satisfied with the outcome, Parliamentary delegate Luis Manuel Capoulas Santos did express frustration with the Council’s "intransigent" attitude. However, he maintained that one third of payments would still be dependent on environmental performance.

If the Parliament decides to make any major changes to the CAP package on Monday, negotiations will have to be reopened with the Commission and Council and the reforms risk being subject to further delays. The transitional year of 2014, when some aspects of the new CAP will gradually come into effect, was made necessary by earlier hold-ups.