Michael Gove, the UK’s secretary of state at the Department of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA), gave his first substantial thoughts on support for agriculture after Brexit on Friday past.

Gove was one of the leaders of the vote leave campaign in the UK referendum and seen as a key ally of Boris Johnston in the Conservative leadership vote before a last-minute withdrawal of support and unsuccessful pursuit of the leadership himself. He was dropped from the cabinet after Theresa May’s election, but restored as DEFRA minister after this year’s general election.

He is considered a political heavyweight with considerable intellect, though lacking in charisma, which is so necessary in the political world.

A strong believer in the free market, he used last Friday’s speech to deliver his vision of a green Brexit and emphasised how the current CAP payment system would be abolished.

The choice of venue for the speech – the WWF’s Living Planet Centre – and his declaration of being an environmentalist was further evidence that this speech would be about the environment first and farming second, if at all.

The substance of the speech was strong on rhetoric with lines like Brexit being a “once in a lifetime opportunity to reform how we care for our land, rivers and seas”.

Interestingly, Greenpeace was somewhat damning with faint praise for the secretary of state. It noted that he had made positive statements on the environment, but it would be watching to see how this translated into government policy.

The Greenpeace spokesperson also pointed out that it was EU environmental law that cleaned beaches, banned dangerous chemicals and held his department to account for failure to tackle illegal air pollution.

Without these (EU) regulations, a dirty Brexit was more likely than a green one, Greenpeace added.

Farming was included in the Gove speech and while prefixing with the view that future subsidies must benefit the environment, he did commit to “generously support farmers for many years to come”.

He recognised that farming was exposed to external shocks and unpredictable events and was supportive of financial support and mechanisms that would smooth out the volatility that farmers face.

In a further swipe at CAP, he highlighted that the current payment system gives resources to the already wealthy and encourages land use that is wasteful of natural resources.

The present UK parliament is committed to maintaining the budget for agriculture for its duration, which should be until the middle of 2022. However, given the political make-up after the recent election, there are doubts if it will last that long.

In any case, future British agriculture policy is to be shaped in this parliament and be implemented in the next. By coincidence, the current CAP is also under review, with its successor scheduled to be in place for 2020.

With the parallel process in place in Whitehall and Brussels, it will be interesting to note how a divergence in policy develops or will there be similar elements.

Investment

From a farming perspective, it was notable in Gove’s speech that there was a need for investment in farmers and farming and a recognition of farming’s importance to the UK, even if there were strings attached.

He also accepted that there was merit in supporting upland farming from a social perspective, which would be contrary to the policy of environmentalists who are of the belief that this land should be allowed return to nature.

It was clear that there was a recognition that farming needed support to be sustained and that there was a merit in government being supportive where the market wouldn’t work on its own, even if the conditions for farmers were based on environmental measures.

Two weeks previously, the EU shared its findings in the consultation on what CAP 2020 should look like based on the responses received to its 12-week consultation between February and May.

In this, responses from environmental movements were, as expected, insisting on payments being linked to environmental measures.

However, there was also an expectation on the part of farm organisations that they would have to do more for the environment in the next CAP and there was less divergence of opinion than might have been expected.

On markets, the EU is looking at legislating on getting more transparency in the supply chain and a better deal for farmers who are seen as the weakest link when confronted by large multi-national processors and supermarkets.

In the UK, action has already been taken with the groceries code adjudicator. As for the environment, while the optics may suggest it will be a higher priority in the UK post-Brexit, it will also be centre-stage in the 2020 CAP as well, with the EU Agriculture Commissioner being a regular user of the phrase that farmers will be the “boots on the ground” that will deliver environmental policies.

Reports in Brussels trade publication, Agra Facts, suggest that the Estonian presidency are looking at development of risk management tools to address market volatility. There is a certain similarity with Michael Gove’s recognition of the need to have a mechanism to protect farmers from the impact of external events.

While there is a divergence of language and emphasis between Brussels and Whitehall on future farm supports, in practice there is scope for considerable similarity given the shared starting points of the need to support farming, protect the environment and deliver the reduction in greenhouse gas emissions agreed at COP 21 in Paris.