Building a new CAP by farmers, for farmers with the European Alliance for Regenerative Agriculture
“Prioritising farmers in the post-2027 Common Agricultural Policy is essential for a sustainable food system. By focusing on their insights, we can reduce bureaucracy and provide meaningful support, enabling farmers to adopt regenerative practices. This partnership with EARA aims to influence future policies that benefit both agricultural productivity and environmental health.”
“Farming with nature for highest food, fiber and public good productivity is an immensely complex task. Agricultural policies must develop the capacities of individual farmers, not alienate their expertise and motivation by prescribing piecemeal actions for partially arresting externalities of conventional production systems.”
EIT Food is funding a proof-of-concept study through EARA which will explore validating Net Primary Productivity for performance measurement of European agricultural land management. The assessment, in addition to Eurostat style data of inputs and outputs, will be based on two key indicators which measure agronomical and ecological performance: photosynthesis and soil cover.
Using these findings, EIT Food and EARA aim to demonstrate that farms with higher photosynthesis and more soil cover on their fields produce both better yields and see environmental benefits (as they require fewer inputs, such as fertilisers). After collecting this data from European farmers, EARA hopes to influence future performance-based payments under the post-2027 CAP. This will help to generate a simple, meaningful and long-term subsidy system where both farmers and the natural environment can thrive.
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The survey will run until the end of August and is open to European farmers.