Italy: coupled aid for 2023

Within the CAP strategic plan, the document in which each EU Member State details how it will spend CAP resources (EUR 33.5 billion for Italy from 2023 to 2027, or EUR 7.3 billion per year), Italy has chosen to allocate the maximum possible funds to coupled support, taking into account the constraints imposed by Regulation (EU) 20115/2022, i.e., 15% of direct payments, of which 2% are for protein crops (soybeans, leguminous cereals, annual leguminous grassland only).

The Italian trade press explains that for the five-year period 2023-2027, the resources amount to EUR 524.5 million per year, the third largest figure of direct payments, after basic support (EUR 1,679 million) and the ecological package (EUR 874 million). The resources are distributed among the production sectors, ensuring in most cases continuity with recent years: livestock (41.6%) and food-crop cultivation (58.4%).
For surface crops that are considered strategic, Italy can use EUR 306 million per year (58.4% of the total), divided into two groups:
– surface crops (77.2%);
– surface protein crops (22.8%).
The aid will be paid to active farmers through a payment for each hectare of crops deemed eligible.

The actual unit amounts are determined annually by the AGEA (the Italian state agency responsible for coordinating and organizing payments of EU funds to farmers) on the basis of the hectares eligible for support in the year in question within the available payment caps.

Processing tomatoes
In the case of processing tomatoes, some difficulties remain despite the importance of this sector in Italy, since this country is the main producer in Europe, with 52% of European production in 2021 and a positive trade balance in quantity and value.
In fact, the competent authorities believe that it is necessary to strengthen the sector further, since it contributes positively to the EU's agri-food trade balance and because it is of extreme strategic importance for the supply of the secondary agri-food industrial sector.

But difficulties persist, on the one hand, due to the evolution of supply (decrease of planted surfaces and production over the period 2015-2019), and, on the other hand, to strong competition from non-European productions and to profitability issues that plague the sector. The operating margin per hectare followed a negative trend over the 2009-2019 decade, although it has somewhat recovered in the last five years, thanks to the positive effects of coupled premiums conditioned by contracts with the processing industry and the organization of supply by the POs. Therefore, it seems wise and desirable to maintain coupled support, which was also used in the previous programming by Spain, Portugal, France and Greece, where growers were granted higher premiums per hectare than in Italy.
Developing productivity is also necessary to counter the risk of seeing an increase in imports of processed tomato products (mainly pastes) from China and the United States, and to guarantee food supplies for EU citizens at affordable prices under any circumstances, without them having to suffer too much from negative external events, such as the current conflict between Russia and Ukraine.

A share equal to 2% of the financing of coupled aid, equivalent to an annual cap of EUR 10.4 million and an estimated payment of EUR 173 /ha, is allocated to the coupled premium for processing tomatoes.
 

From the 2024 claim year onwards, growers requesting coupled aid will be obliged to use certified plant material of varieties listed in the registers of varieties or in the common European catalog, without prejudice to the possibility for organic farms to use conventional seed when organic seed is not available on the market. To obtain coupled aid, growers of processing tomatoes will have to sign supply contracts with an industrial processing operator.

Some complementary information
2023-2027 CAP: sostegno accopiato alle produzioni vegetali (2023-2027 CAP: coupled support for crop production)