THE 2023-2027 PROGRAMMING PERIOD

The situation changed decisively when the post 2020 CAP proposals came to light, thanks to two choices made by the European Commission. The first was the proposal for 25% of the resources that were intended to go to decoupled direct payments to be directed instead towards a new category of interventions, programmes for the environment and climate (ecoschemes), which would take the form of (mostly) annual payments in order to address two at least of the following issues:

However, neither rural nor environmental policy measures have been implemented in Greece despite their well established value and the petitions from academia a. climate change mitigation, including the reduction of GHG emissions from farming, as well as maintenance of carbon sinks and increased carbon sequestration b. adaptation to climate change, including improvement of food systems’ resilience and biodiversity c. protection and/or improvement of water quality and reduction of pressure to water resources d. prevention of soil degradation, soil restoration, imrovement of soil fertility and soil nutrient/biota management e. biodiversity protection, conservation or restoration of habitats and species, including landscape characteristics f. sustainable and reduced plant protection products, especially substances that present risk for human health and biodiversity g. improvement of animal welfare and mitigation of microbial resistance (Reg 2115/2021).

The second crucial proposal of the European Commission has been the flexibility allowed to Member States to either comply with the strict WTO rule mentioned above or resort to the option of considering ecoschemes as top-up direct payments that do not create market distortion, since they are completeley decoupled from the quantities produced, prices and production factors, meaning they could be classified within the green box payments.

Apart from the above, quite indicative as far as the promotion of agroforestry is concerned, it is important to highlight the fact that the maintenance of agroforestry systems has been among the actions explicitly suggested by the EC (EC, 2021a), but that have been also included in the EC recommendations to Greece, refering to the national CAP Strategic Plan. Within these recommendations, the low presence of landscape features on Greek farming areas was clearly mentioned as a deficiency, suggesting the need for remediation actions to be taken (EC, 2021b).

All these new developments have made possible the inclusion of agroforestry systems maintenance in the programmes for climate and the environment (ecoschemes of the new Programming Period). The relevant intervention “Improvement of Agroforestry systems rich in landscape features”, covers annual crop areas with the presence of either forest (oaks, pines, cypress, poplars etc.) or productive trees (citrus, pome, stone fruits and nuts, olive, carob etc.), scatered, aligned or at the field margins, but also in extensively cultivated tree plantations coinciding with annual crops.

Furthermore, this intervention also targets wooded pastures with a tree cover up to 40% and herbaceous or woody undergrowth. The support provided for the maintenance is 100 €/ha. The obligation of beneficiaries comprises of the clearance of undesired trees and bushes without the use of synthetic herbicides, while in cases of grazed areas, alternate grazing must be observed. Finally, in order to receive the support, farmers have to remove all invasive alien species from the eligible area adjacent to their parcels during the winter period. In order to ensure the apporpriate implementation of the provisions under this intervention, it is deemed necessary and supported financially, to design, implement and monitor of a biodiversity conservation plan, as well as a plant protection programme, in order to provide the right care to trees and bushes, to remove invasive species, but also to complete cease of synthetic plant protection products´use.

It is worth noting that the supported action under this ecoscheme, especially for farmers managing more than 10 hectares of arable land, goes beyond the obligation they already have to maintain a proportion of their arable land uncultivated or under non productive uses including land left fallow and/or hosting/including landcsape features. Within the landscape features included are terraces, ditches, ponds, wildlife sites (e.g. rocky habitats), footpaths, small rural constructions and hedgerows. Furthermore, cutting and pruning hedges and trees is forbiden during the bird reproduction period.

On the one hand this ecoscheme provides an incentive for farmers to continue their farming activities and not abandon the land. And, on the other hand, to actively improve planning and their performance, based on specific practices like cease the use of synthetic plant protection products, clearance, removal of invasive species, and alternate grazing among other actions, with the objective to conserve biodiversity and the landscape, but also contribute to fire prevention and combat erosion.