cultivar_22_Final_EN

CAP post-2020: improving environmental protection while preserving the necessary competitiveness 51 a difficult economic and budgetary context both at the EU level and in a large number of Member States (MS). Indeed, for several years now, farm holdings, upstream and downstream, have faced very volatile markets and prices and an increasing number of income crises. On the budgetary front, the BREXIT will automatically lead to a reduction in the EU budget and, likely, to a decrease in the CAP budget too, not to mention the fact that many voices are calling for greater attention and therefore increased budgetary support for priori- ties deemed more important, such as economic growth, education, migration policy, etc. In other words, the CAP budget is and will remain under pressure. It is within this threefold framework − increased con- sideration of environmental objectives in the CAP, simultaneous consideration of other objectives, in particular competitiveness and economic performance objectives, and pressure on the EU budget and more specifically on the budget that will be allocated to the CAP in the future −, that the review of the environmental dimension of the CAP, and more generally of all the measures in this policy, should be carried out. How can environmental protection be better taken into account in the CAP? Environmental protection requires improving and completing the currently available toolbox. Gener- ally speaking, the aim is to encourage virtuous develop- ments that increase the sup- ply of environmental services and discourage practices and systems that generate environmental disservices, by means of incentive meas- ures rather than obligations and within a framework of increased solidarity within sectors and territories. Improving current instruments: moving from an obligation of means to an obligation of results, and furthering payments for environmental services Certain technical shortcomings of the current CAP can be corrected within the framework of the instru- ments applied today, and such corrections do not necessarily have a negative impact on farm incomes: for instance, the implementation of the greening measure relating to EFAs on a territorial scale greater than that of the farm could be envisaged, with compen- sation for farmers who would be obliged to have a larger EFA (because this is an envi- ronmentally relevant obli- gation) by those who would implement a smaller EFA. Likewise, the agri-environmental and climate meas- ures (AECMs) of the second pillar would benefit from being implemented over longer periods of time than at present. Their spatial continuity should be encouraged, for instance in the form of agglom- eration bonuses granted to neighbouring farmers making a collective commitment. More importantly, the constraint of only compensating for additional costs and/or income losses should be overcome by allowing remuneration for positive environmental services above minimum levels defined by either the legislation or the conditionality and greening criteria of the first pillar. Such developments will be facilitated by the shift from an obligation of means to be implemented (current situation) to an obligation of results (impacts on environ- mental services), although the actual difficulties of that shift are clear. The shift would simultaneously facilitate the development of markets for environmental services and payments for environmental services (PES) provided by the intermediate and/or final It is within this threefold framework − increased consideration of environmental objectives in the CAP, simultaneous consideration of other objectives and pressure on the EU budget … that the review of the environmental dimension of the CAP… should be carried out. … we should allow remuneration for positive environmental services above minimum levels … Such developments will be facilitated by the shift from an obligation of means to be implemented (current situation) to an obligation of results (impacts on environmental services) …