2454 final report.pdf - Agra CEAS Consulting

Evaluation of the Community Plant Health Regime: Final Report
DG SANCO Evaluation Framework Contract Lot 3 (Food Chain)
compliance can be considered to potentially contribute to ensuring adherence to plant
quarantine requirements. Nevertheless, as analysed by FCEC during the study of the impacts
of several options to manage Diabrotica virgifera in future, the crop rotation obligations set
up by MS under the cross compliance scheme were not sufficiently robust to be considered as
being useful in terms of combating Diabrotica virgifera. A study carried out in 2007 for DG
AGRI 258 has identified nine MS with GAEC obligations for maintaining soil organic matter
through crop rotations, i.e. CY, DE, EL, FR, IE, LU, MT, SL, UK. In these MS, the study
concludes that these obligations are either formulated rather vaguely (e.g. IE, MT, UK) or
seem to be easy to comply with, for instance in FR and DE where the obligation is defined at
the level of the surface area cultivated by the farm.
More generally, crop rotation brings several advantages as follows:
Improving or maintaining soil fertility and structure;
Ensuring proper management of nutrients by balancing the fertility demands of various
crops to avoid excessive depletion of soil nutrients, and by replenishment of nitrogen
through the use of green manure in sequence with cereals, and other crops with resultant
reduced need for reliance on chemical input;
Reducing farmers‘ reliance on chemical inputs of fertilisers and PPPs, thereby having a
positive impact on water and air quality, and on biodiversity;
Reducing the risk of crops suffering adverse weather effects by the planting of different
crops, which can be of particular relevance in the light of the climate change effects that
agriculture is facing.
Here again, cross compliance measures appear complementary to the solidarity regime as
currently implemented, by targeting pro-active prevention, whereas the solidarity regime has
historically targeted the control and eradication of HOs.
As a conclusion, several means exist for EU financial support to plant health management in
future such as the solidarity regime, the POSEIMA (as regards Madeira Island and the
Azores) and POSEIDOM (for the DOM regions of France) managed by DG SANCO, the
‗Article 68‘ measures of the ‗Health Check‘ of the CAP as well as measures 225, 226 and 227
under the Rural Development Regulation 1698/2005, and - in a complementary role - crosscompliance
to provide incentives for better prevention. Not all schemes have the same
objectives, eligibility criteria and rules for co-financing by the EU. The existence of multiple
schemes managed either by DG SANCO or by DG AGRI suggests a need for improved
communication between both DGs in future, not least to ensure that there is no double
funding for the same measures. The possibility of merging the different sources of funding in
order to achieve better management and transparency, and the establishment of a financial
instrument for plant health should be further explored (this is discussed further in section 5.9).
257 Commission Decision 2003/766/EC of 24 October 2003 on emergency measures to prevent the spread within
the Community of Diabrotica virgifera Le Conte imposes crop rotation in the demarcated focus and safety zones
to be defined in case of an outbreak of Diabrotica virgifera.
258 Alliance Environment, Evaluation of the application of cross compliance as foreseen under regulation
1782/2003, July 2007
Food Chain Evaluation Consortium 265