A FUTURE without farming subsidies could have a crushing impact on the sustainability of not only Scotland’s farming communities but on the greater environmental benefits that their stewardship of the land provides.

During an unattributed briefing in Brussels, a DG Agri official of the EU Commission discussed Scotland's Less Favoured Area Support Scheme which has offered a financial lifeline for 11,000 of Scotland’s farmers – and voiced concern that, if that targeted EU funding is not replaced after Brexit, there could be land abandonment and with it a knock-on impact on the wider benefits that farmers and crofters offer Scotland.

“An obvious implication of a future without subsidies is that farmers stop producing, which has consequences in terms of food security but more importantly the consequences are potentially calamitous for the environment,” stressed the official. “It is one thing for farmers to stop producing but the fact of the matter is farmers are critically important stewards of the landscape. If you look at what has happened in the US where farmers have effectively abandoned land and you have dust bowls and so on,” he accentuated. “If the Highlands of Scotland – which are a particular eco system – were to be abandoned by farmers, there is no one who is going to manage that territory.”

Scotland’s LFA land offers lower economic output, but farming this land keeps people in the countryside and contributing to the maintenance of a valuable ecosystem. Subsidies were an incentive for farmers and crofters to stay on the land and if these were to be removed, the environmental consequences of their departure would be 'unthinkable'.

The Commission official voiced the opinion that most of the 508 million people in the EU failed to realise the contribution the Common Agricultural Policy makes to maintaining job security.

“Without those farmers we wouldn’t have the produce; without that produce we wouldn’t have the processing and without the processing we wouldn’t have the jobs,” he explained. “There are a number of links in the chain and those dots need to be joined up,” he continued. “We need to impress upon people the importance of the CAP to all of the citizens of Europe, in terms of job creation and food security.”

The feeling in the EU Commission is that public perceptions towards farm income support has seen a significant shift towards demanding increased environmental dimensions to funding. However, there are concerns that increasing pressures for farmers to improve their climate contributions are being met by the challenge of cuts in direct payments. The future CAP budget for the EU is set to face a 4% cut to direct payments to farmers and crofters.

“We are cutting direct payments but asking farmers to do more and that is a problem, but the reality is public perception is that CAP is about food subsidies and subsidising agriculture and keeping food prices artificially high,” explained the Commission official. “That is not a narrative that we share and certainly not one that farmers would share, but nonetheless it is a perception and part of addressing this perception is requiring farmers to do more in terms of the environment.”

On the subject of Defra minister Michael Gove’s proposal to move away from an income support-based model for agriculture towards a public goods model, the officials said that the EU Commission was not looking to make such an extreme change to its entire farm support system.

“While we will expect farmers to do more in terms of their contribution to the environment and climate, there will also continue to be a significant element of direct income support and a safety net for incomes included in our proposals,” he concluded.

Despite a greater consideration towards environmental contributions, current proposals in the EU parliament suggest that a proportion of the CAP budget – whether it be 50% or 60% of direct payments – should be ring fenced as income support with no other purpose than supporting farm incomes.