Editing Common Agricultural Policy (section)

====European Commission Report and decoupling (2003)====
A 2003 report, commissioned by the European Commission, by a group of experts led by Belgian economist [[André Sapir]] stated that the budget structure was a "historical relic".<ref name=sapir>{{cite web|url=http://www.swisscore.org/Policy%20docs/general_research/sapir_report_en.pdf |title=Sapir Report on budget reforms |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060928112500/http://www.swisscore.org/Policy%20docs/general_research/sapir_report_en.pdf |archive-date=28 September 2006}}</ref> The report suggested a reconsideration of EU policy, redirecting expenditure towards measures intended to increase wealth creation and cohesion of the EU. As a significant proportion of the budget is currently spent on agriculture and there is little prospect of the budget being increased, that would require reducing CAP expenditure. The report largely concerned itself to discussing alternative measures more useful to the EU, rather than discussing the CAP, but it also suggested that farm aid would be administered more effectively by member countries on an individual basis.

The report's findings were largely ignored. Instead, CAP spending was kept within the remit of the EU, and France led an effort to agree a fixed arrangement for CAP spending that would not be changed until 2012. It was made possible by advance agreement with Germany. It is that agreement that the UK currently wishes to see reopened, both in its efforts to defend the UK position on the [[UK rebate]] and also given that the UK is in favour of lowering barriers to entry for developing nations that are agricultural exporters.<ref name=economist>{{cite news |title=The battle of the budget |url=http://www.economist.com/World/europe/displayStory.cfm?story_id=3722828 | newspaper=The Economist | date=3 March 2005 |access-date=6 November 2014}}</ref>

On 26 June 2003, EU farm ministers adopted a fundamental reform of the CAP, based on "decoupling" subsidies from particular crops. (Member states could choose to maintain a limited amount of specific subsidy.) The new "single farm payments" were subject to "cross-compliance" conditions relating to environmental, food safety and animal welfare standards. Many of them were already either good practice recommendations or separate legal requirements regulating farm activities. The aim was to make more money available for environmental quality or animal welfare programmes. The political scientist [[Peter Nedergaard]] analysed the 2003 reform on the basis of [[rational choice theory]] and stated that, "In order to arrive at an adequate explanation, an account of the policy entrepreneurship on the part of Commissioner [[Franz Fischler]] must be given."<ref>{{cite journal | last = Nedergaard | first = Peter | title = The 2003 reform of the Common Agricultural Policy: against all odds or rational explanations? | journal = [[Journal of European Integration]] | volume = 28 | issue = 3 | pages = 203–223 | publisher = [[Taylor and Francis]] | doi = 10.1080/07036330600785749 | date = July 2006 | s2cid = 154437960 | url = https://curis.ku.dk/ws/files/239517424/The_2003_Reform_of_the_Common_Agricultural_Policy_Against_all_Odds_or_Rational_Explanations.pdf }}
:''See also'': {{cite web | last = Fischler | first = Franz | author-link = Franz Fischler | title = Speech by Commissioner Fischler – From Cancun – The road ahead for the trade and agriculture negotiations (transcript of speech) | url = http://eu-un.europa.eu/articles/en/article_2747_en.htm | website = eu-un.europa.eu | publisher = European Union Delegation to the United Nations – New York: EU@UN – Partnership in Action | date = 16 September 2003 | access-date = 27 February 2016 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20150915190549/http://eu-un.europa.eu/articles/en/article_2747_en.htm | archive-date = 15 September 2015 | url-status = dead}}</ref>

Details of the UK scheme were still being decided at its introductory date of May 2005. Details of the scheme in each member country could be varied subject to outlines issued by the EU. In England, the [[Single Payment Scheme]] provided a single flat rate payment of around £230 per hectare for maintaining land in cultivatable condition. In Scotland, payments were based on a historical basis and could vary widely. This scheme allowed for much wider non-production use of land that might still receive the environmental element of the support. Additional payments were available if land was managed in a prescribed environmental manner.

The overall EU and national budgets for subsidy were capped. That prevented the EU being required to spend more on the CAP than its limited budget.

The reforms entered into force in 2004–2005. (Member states could apply for a transitional period delaying the reform in their country to 2007 and phasing in reforms until 2012)<ref>{{cite web |url=http://ec.europa.eu/agriculture/capreform/index_en.htm |title=2003 subsidy reforms| publisher=EU|access-date=1 November 2007 }}</ref>