Welsh Government has issued a written statement in response to their 'Sustainable Farming and our Land' Consultation: Proposals to continue and simplify agricultural support for farmers and the rural economy.
NFU Cymru submitted a detailed response to the consultation that closed on the 23rd October 2020 which you can read here.
In response to the written statement, NFU Cymru President John Davies commented: “NFU Cymru is pleased that Welsh Government will be taking forward the majority of BPS proposals outlined in the simplification consultation, addressing a number of issues of long running concern to the union. The changes to the greening rules from 2021, removing crop-diversification requirements and removing the bureaucracy associated with current EFA rules, will remove the heavy administrative burden associated with current greening rules for our growers.
“The proposed changes to cross-border applications will hopefully mean in future that the 600 or so farmers whose land straddles the Wales - England border will no longer face delayed payments. We welcome confirmation that an advance BPS payment will be made in October from 2021, this will help with cash flow and business planning for Welsh farmers.
"With regards to the BPS proposals there remain some further points of clarification and detail that we require from RPW and we will be seeking to obtain these in the coming weeks to ensure that the changes are made in time for the issuing of 2021 SAF Guidance and the opening of the 2021 SAF window."
With regards to the RDP element of the proposals John Davies said: "We will need to consider these in more detail. In our response to the consultation we raised a number of concerns over how Welsh Government proposes to deliver its own domestic RDP following the ending of the Brexit transition period. We also have long standing concerns over the implementation of the current EU RDP and we have repeatedly called for these concerns to be addressed through a full independent review.”