Agriculture and Environment Future of European Rural Development. Cracow, 30 November – 1 December 2005 Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development

National Agri-environmental Programme Usual good farming practices 7 packages Plan of AE commitments elaborated by AE field officer

Packages „sustainable farming”, based on fertilisers’ input reduction, balancing of fertilisers’ management and utilisation and on keeping a proper crop rotation; „organic farming”, based on utilisation of organic farming methods in the meaning of the Act on organic farming; „maintenance of extensive meadows”, related to re-introduction or continuation of grass- cutting, starting from the 1st July (or 15 August), on meadows of high nature values, endangered with degradation; „maintenance of extensive pastures” based on usage of low-input grazing as the main way of land management on semi-natural habitats, traditionally managed as pastures;

Packages „water and soil protection”, based on intercrops implementation, in order to increase the share of soils covered by plants during the autumn – winter period; „buffer zones”, based on maintaince or introduction of buffer zones and strips in order to protect water, soils and biodiversity „protection of local farm animal races”, based on maintenance of local race farm animals herds (horses, cattle and sheep), that are endangered with extinction.

Payment and Area of Implementation: Package PaymentAoI sustainable farming 160 PLN/ha Priority Zones organic farming 260 – 1800 PLN/ha Entire country maintenance of extensive meadows PLN/ha Priority Zones maintenance of extensive pastures PLN/ha Priority Zones water and soil protection 330 – 570 PLN/ha Entire country buffer zones PLN/100m Entire country protection of local farm animal races PLN/ animal Entire country

Implementation of NAP till 18th of November Number of applications – soil and water protection – , organic farming – 6.995, buffer zones – 64, extensive meadows and pastures – Amount – PLN Area – ha

New agri-environmental programme New approach based on prior experiences Verification of existing packages New packages (pond package, water pool, protection of local plants, mosaic of arable land)

Remarks on implementation of agri-environmental programmes Relatively high absorption Agri-environmental advisers Regionalization in implementation of some packages Low number of packages Low payments

Agri-environmental programme Programming based on prior experiences New possibilities (Natura 2000 payments, non- productive investments) New agri-environmental packages

Agri-environmental programme Basic conditions and the beneficiary according to the on-going programme Application procedure – based on the on-going system (modification in application form and agri-environmental plan).

Agri-environmental programme Horizontal approach (possibility of regionalization of payments and requirements) Usual good farming practice and „cross – compliance” Modification of the packages and new packages

Agri- environmental packages Nature packages (basic package, valuable grassland); Water packages (buffer zones, water-pools, extensive ponds) Arable land packages (integrated production, biological production, anti-erosion package, mosaic of arable land)