The proposed CAP legislation launched in 2018 made two important innovations in the governance of the CAP. First, it gave much greater flexibility to Member States in the way CAP interventions and CAP rules could be defined in individual countries. Second, it proposed to change the monitoring of Member State actions and the use made of the EU CAP budget from detailed compliance with very specific rules set out in legislation to a more performance-based approach.
The Commission’s motivation was clear. It expected that giving greater flexibility to Member States to design their own CAP interventions and rules would ensure better value for money because the interventions would be more effective. As former Commissioner Hogan noted when launching the policy proposal, the ‘one size fits all’ approach is no longer appropriate in a Union with very diverse agricultural structures and challenges. He also defended this approach on the grounds that it would lead to greater simplification of the policy for national administrations and farmers, though we can agree that this was never really going to convince anyone.… Read the rest
