ECOLOGICAL FOCUS Areas – the reformed Common Agricultural Policy's flagship nature protection measure – will deliver negligible benefits for Europe’s wildlife, it has been claimed.

Research by the European Environmental Bureau and BirdLife Europe suggested that while farmers were meeting the stated aim of EFAs on paper, by ensuring that at least 5% of total EU arable land was dedicated to nature protection, in practice crops with negligible effects on biodiversity were being grown on 75% of land declared as EFA.

Some member States were allowing farmers to count commercial crops with no proven biodiversity benefits towards their EFA commitment, and continued pesticide use meant that these areas' wildlife potential remained limited. With this in mind, the European Commission recently tabled a proposal to ban the use of pesticides on EFAs, but this is currently being blocked by over a dozen member states.

EEB policy officer Leonardo Mazza said: “Paying farmers to make space for nature is about ensuring that part of our farmed landscape is a safe haven for wildlife such as birds, bees and butterflies. It is therefore scandalous that some of the options EU Member States have made available to farmers to meet their EFA requirement have close to no ecological value.”

BirdLife Europe policy officer Trees Robijns added: “The European Commission’s proposal to exclude the use of pesticides on EFAs deals with a glaringly obvious fault with greening measures. Member States should consider the scientific basis of their opposition to this logical proposal from Commissioner Hogan. €12 billion is spent annually on greening payments; this money should not be spent on maintaining the status quo. The EFA measure, and indeed the CAP as a whole, needs a major overhaul.”