Welcome to Euractiv’s Special CAPitals edition of the Agrifood Brief. Let’s dive straight into a tour of the EU, to find out how the CAP and national policies support farmers coping with the damages caused by extreme weather events.
POLAND
Farmers raise criticism of the system for weather-related loss estimation. Due to the country’s geographical and climate specifics, Polish farmers have to cope with different types of extreme weather events, which seriously threaten crops and can significantly reduce annual yields.
Every year, the Agency for Restructuring and Modernisation of Agriculture (ARiMR), the government’s accredited paying agency for agriculture and rural development, provides financial support for farmers most affected by extreme weather phenomena.
Poland’s Rural Development Programme (PROW) is worth €13.5 billion for the 2014-2020 period and some €8.6 billion of that comes from the EU budget. It offers financial support for investments in the restoration of agricultural land and production potential destroyed as a result of natural disasters. In 2023-27, the total envelope of Rural Development funds is €7.8 billion.
In 2014-2020, the aid took the form of a refund of up to 80% of the eligible costs of the investment. The maximum amount of aid for one beneficiary and per farm could not exceed 300,000 PLN (€68,900).
In case of large-scale events, such as drought, ARiMR launches additional financial schemes and farmers whose crops are damaged can apply for assistance.
The estimation losses on individual farms is up to appointed committees. Farmers can also use a digital application to facilitate cost estimation, but they complain that it still doesn’t always work as it should, creating additional, unnecessary bureaucracy.
There was one more problem that the farmers reported: Committees were established only in areas where a drought disaster has been declared, based on the strict criteria. This means that a lot of farmers who were also affected by droughts were not eligible for the financial assistance if the area was considered not affected enough in general.
According to preliminary estimates, assistance for farmers harmed by unfavorable conditions in 2023 will amount to PLN 1.5 billion (€344 million).
The farmers who suffered from droughts may also apply for preferential loans for restoring production potential. Still, many reject this type of help as in a difficult financial situation, they do not want to take on additional obligations that could put them into debt.
(Aleksandra Krzysztoszek | Euractiv.pl)
GREECE
Towards digital solutions to protect growers. After a difficult year of extreme weather phenomena, both this summer and autumn, Greek farmers tasted firsthand the bitter implications of climate change. The most important phenomenon was that of floods in September 2023, which destroyed hectares of family and professional farms.
Therefore, under a joint decision of the ministers of national economy and finance, rural development and food, digital governance and climate crisis and civil protection in September, it was decided that professional farmers in the areas affected by the floods will receive €2,000/per farm unit in aid.
In addition, the European Commission unlocked on 23 November financial support of €43.1 million from the Agricultural Reserve for 2024 for Greek farmers. Earlier this month, the Minister of Rural Development and Food Lefteris Avgenakis announced that the total package of reimbursement for the plant production in Thessaly will be completed at the end of June 2024.
The Greek CAP Strategic Plan includes a subproject called “Prevention and restoration of damage to forests due to forest fires, natural disasters and conservation of forest genetic resources” worth €60.3 million.
On top of that, September’s disaster gave a push to the development of risk management culture in Greece. The announced digital support to help farmers’ to cope with extreme weather conditions could become reality soon.
On Wednesday (17 January), the Secretary General of the Agri Ministry, George Stratakos, met with a delegation of the Hellenic National Meteorological Service and discussed the agri emergency number ‘112’.
This could be a digital application that will promptly inform and warn farmers or livestock farmers located in the warning zone expected to be affected by extreme weather. This tool, as Euractiv understands, will be very useful for Greek farmers to protect their properties and will be quickly embraced with the appropriate training.
(Maranthi Pelekanaki / Euractiv.gr)
SPAIN
Support to insurance, the main tool for risk management. The Spanish agricultural insurance system was created 45 years ago and it is one of the most developed systems of public aid for farmers who insure their farms or their livestock in Europe.
The Spanish CAP Strategic Plan for 2023-2027 highlights that “maintaining and improving” the system “as a national policy financed with state aid, complemented by specific targeted crisis management measures to certain sectors, in application of the Common Market Organisation (CMO)” is “the most appropriate strategy” to help farmers to face the risks related to climate change.
In 2014-2020, Spain devoted €2 billion to agricultural insurance.
In 2023, the Spanish Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food allocated €317.7 million to the agricultural insurance plan, due to the exceptional increase of €60 million planned for measures to support farmers to face the extreme drought and the consequences of the Ukrainian war.
According to Agroseguro, the entity responsible for the management of agricultural insurance, last year marked a record for policy subscriptions, with €16.9 million euros in insured capital (+3%) and six million hectares, 36.9 million tons and 416 million animals.
It is expected that compensations for damaged farms will exceed €1.2 billion.
But Spanish farmers’ organisations are calling for a reform of the agricultural insurance system, to respond to the climate emergency and to make policy subscriptions more affordable for producers.
(Mercedes Salas / EFEAGRO)
CZECH REPUBLIC
For Prague, prevention is the priority. According to the Czech Agricultural Ministry, in 2015, 2017, and 2018, the country was hit by the worst drought ever, with the consequent compensation to farmers for losses. However, the compensation is an emergency solution, according to the ministry, as the damage must be actively prevented.
“There is a need to breed and grow more resilient – especially drought-resistant – agricultural crops. Keep the soil in good condition, especially to increase the organic matter content, which absorbs water better. Build irrigation systems and other measures,” Agriculture Ministry spokesman Vojtěch Bílý told Euractiv.cz.
In 2017, the government already prepared a strategic document containing measures aimed at protecting against the effects of drought.
“The main initiative in these complicated times must come from farmers,” Bílý added.
Czech experts from the CzechGlobe project – Global Change Research Institute of the Czech Academy of Sciences (GCRI) – have also called for innovation and modern practices.
According to them, farmers want to tackle drought, but they need to have the right tools at their disposal. Another important element, the experts pointed out, is modifying the landscape to have more water-retaining features, such as wetlands and woodlands.
Farmers are also encouraged to implement measures included in the CAP Strategic Plan, with finances adaptation and preventive measures as well as consultancy services and insurance for harvesting and production.
“These interventions (contained in the strategic plan) serve to stabilise producers’ incomes in the event of losses, market disruptions or to prevent or resolve such crises,” Bílý explained. The insurance support covers not only producers but also foresters.
(Aneta Zachová / Euractiv.cz)
ITALY
Challenges and solutions for an increasing climate risk. Extreme weather events have become increasingly frequent and devastating, as happened in Italy in the regions of Emilia-Romagna with the floods of May 2023.
The frequency of extreme weather events is a concern for farmers and it also has consequences for the viability of the economic “safety net” built to protect them.
More frequent and intense climate-related disasters drive the increase in the values of agricultural production covered by subsidised insurance and the rise in insurance tariffs, leading to an ever-growing need for resources.
Structural instruments to guarantee economic support to farms in the event of disasters include Facilitated Insurance, Mutualistic Funds, Income Stabilisation Tools (IST) and finally the Mutualistic Fund against catastrophic events.
In the 2023-2027 CAP, risk management financial resources amounted to €3 billion and Italy launched a National Catastrophic Mutual Fund.
Farmers’ risk management tools awareness is scattered across the country. Growers in Northern Italy are the greatest users of these tools, the farmers association CIA-Agricoltori Italiani told Euractiv. The Regions of Piedmont, Lombardy, Veneto, Trentino-Alto Adige, Friuli-Venezia Giulia and Emilia-Romagna, account for almost 90% of insurance coverage at the national level.
In central and southern Italy, despite several information campaigns, risk management tools have not reached a comparable level of adoption in the farms.
According to Stefano Francia, representative of CIA-Agricoltori Italiani, on of the reason is the lack of incentives. The public support, Francia told Euractiv, is not enough. “The amount allocated by the CAP is absolutely insufficient to guarantee adequate support for farms that want use the available risk management tools”.
(Simone Cantarini / Euractiv.it)
BULGARIA
Sofia allocates €60 million for natural disaster risk management. Bulgaria has earmarked a modest budget of €60 million in its CAP National Strategic Plan for helping farmers manage the risks of natural disasters, the Ministry of Agriculture told Euractiv Bulgaria.
The state plans to make a financial contribution from 2025 to support farmers when concluding insurance contracts, but this instrument does not cover vineyards. Also, Bulgaria wants to create a mutual fund for farmers, including the wine sector.
This mutual fund will be designed to stabilize the income of farmers suffering damages from climate and natural disasters. It will be directly related to actual financial losses for farmers.
Separately, Bulgaria has planned €6.2 million for the restoration of agricultural potential after natural disasters or catastrophic events.
The budget is aimed at investment support for machines and equipment, including real estate. Bulgaria had the green light from Brussels for a direct state aid scheme, covering from 80 to 100% of the average production costs for growing a given crop in the relevant economic year.
Full compensation for farmers in case of total crop destruction is decided on a case-by-case basis by the Ministry of Agriculture.
At the end of December, Cyprus, Bulgaria, Greece, and Croatia announced they would join forces in an effort to convince their European partners to increase EU funding to deal with the adverse effects of climate change on agriculture.
The four countries want to act together in the EU to allocate more funds, ensuring fast and efficient financing, and are pushing for the creation of a crisis climate mechanism to become part of the European Agricultural Reserve Fund, in which up to 3% of the funds from the EU’s Common Agricultural Program will be collected.
(Krasen Nikolov / Euractiv.bg)
ROMANIA
Accurate diagnosis, insufficient measures. According to the Ministry of Agriculture, in Romania climate change exposes crops to numerous extreme climatic events, resulting in significant production losses across the country, particularly in the southeastern, southern, southwest, and the economically developed Bucharest-Ilfov region.
A recent study led by Ruxandra Malina Petrescu-Mag, lecturer at Babeș-Bolyai University in Cluj, revealed that 94% of farmers are aware of climate change risks in their areas. The study participants, however, pointed out the shortage of labor and lack of technology as the main obstacles to adopting strategies to protect themselves from the impact of extreme weather phenomena.
Romania’s agriculture remains highly dependent on weather conditions and a significant concern is the deficient irrigation system.
Following unsuccessful attempts to secure National Recovery and Resilience Plan financing for irrigation systems, Bucharest decided to allocate €1.5 billion (on a total amount of €15 billion national and EU funds) within the CAP National Strategic Plan for 2023-2027, addressing irrigation, soil erosion, and desiccation.
Consequently, farmers can access non-reimbursable funds, with a maximum limit of €500,000 per beneficiary, for establishing irrigation systems through a new financing line available from January 2024.
The CAP National Strategic Plan insists that the agricultural sector must enter the digital age to respond to climate challenges. However, the target pursued by Romania is to have only 0.03% of farms benefit from CAP support for digital agriculture technology by 2029.
(Catalina Mihai / Euractiv.ro)
[Edited by Zoran Radosavljevic and Angelo Di Mambro]