The Government, through the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food and the Spanish Agricultural Guarantee Fund (FEGA), has coordinated the payment of more than 22 million euros to La Rioja (22,799,190 euros) of direct aid from the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) of the 2023 campaign.

These are the first payments of the new CAP 2023-2027, which entered into force on January 1, 2023 and which leaves a total of more than 3,475 million euros for all the autonomous communities during the 2023 campaign, until last December 31 and whose advance payment deadline began on October 16.

The overall amount of more than 3.475 billion, paid as of December 31, is similar to that made in other first campaigns in which a new Common Agricultural Policy has been launched, due to the specificities involved in these transition years.

In the specific case of the CAP 2023 campaign, the period for submitting applications began in March, a month later than usual, since the regulations required the conversion of basic payment rights to basic income support rights for sustainability before the deadline for submission.

The initial deadline was extended by one month, until June 30, 2023, at the request of the autonomous communities and the sector, to facilitate their adaptation to new developments in the management of applications. This has also led to extensions of deadlines for the modification of requests, the presentation of georeferenced photographs and the management of incidents derived from monitoring controls.

Aspects of the new CAP

The new CAP has incorporated new interventions, such as eco-schemes; or new requirements, such as those established in this period for the fulfilment of the status of active farmer, which require additional controls to be carried out by the autonomous communities prior to the payment of aid, in order to guarantee the proper use of European Union funds.

Likewise, controls have been strengthened to prevent direct aid from being requested fraudulently on areas that the applicant does not have at his disposal (either in ownership or under usufruct, lease or parking).

All these issues have involved adaptations in the payment schedule of the different interventions, so it is necessary to wait for the end of the period of payment of direct aid, on June 30, 2024, so that the 4,875 million euros that must be received by the 622,400 farmers and ranchers who submitted their single application in 2023 are completed.

The distribution of the amounts paid, by aid schemes, is as follows:

(See press release)

From 1 December, the payment of up to 90% of the basic income support and its supplementary payments was authorised. Also, from 1 December, it was possible to transfer up to 90% of the payment of eco-schemes and aid schemes associated with the sustainable production of proteins of vegetable origin, rice, sugar beet, tomato for transformation, nuts in areas at risk of desertification, traditional production of raisins and olives with specific difficulties and high environmental value, as well as aid associated with livestock farming, except for aid for the fattening of calves.

Only applications for which all checks have been completed may be eligible for such payments.

Once the allocation of rights from the National Reserve of Basic Income Aid (1 April 2024 as the deadline) has been carried out, as well as the calculation of final unit amounts, remnants and transfers between interventions (before 1 May 2024), the payment of the remaining 10% will be authorized, whose deadline for becoming effective ends on 30 June 2024.

With regard to the specific payment for cotton and aid for the fattening of calves, the eligibility requirements for this aid cannot be verified until the beginning of the year 2024, since the calculation of the unit amount is based on the production units (hectares and number of animals) that meet all the requirements of these aid schemes. As in the other schemes, the deadline for making payments for these two grants expires on 30 June 2024.