In his first few weeks as NI agriculture minister, Edwin Poots has referred on a number of occasions to his preference for a return to coupled payments as a means of supporting productive farmers.

Specifically, he has floated the idea of re-introducing headage-based payments for the likes of suckler cows and ewes.

While the sentiment is correct, it is not within his gift to completely overhaul the system, and go back to paying producers on the basis of livestock numbers.

Firstly, there are the World Trade Organisation (WTO) commitments made by various trading blocs to limit the amount of aid that is directly linked to production. Secondly, there are the EU rules which keep the total support going into coupled schemes to 8% of the total direct payments, or 13% in exceptional cases.

It will not be possible for NI to put in place a system that is radically different to the EU

With Brexit, in theory the UK could step outside these EU rules to implement its own system, but the withdrawal agreement signed up to by British Prime Minister Boris Johnson effectively leaves NI following single market rules for goods.

It will not be possible for NI to put in place a system that is radically different to the EU.

So if the budget is limited to 13% of the total, it is £155/cow, or £100 per suckler cow and £14 per ewe.

Interestingly, the island of Ireland is one of the few parts of the EU not to have coupled payments in the beef sector, with 23 member states targeting beef animals at an average of €88/head.

In 2016, DAERA consulted on the introduction of coupled payments for 2017 to 2019. But only NIMEA and the LMC supported a coupled payment on suckler cows, to be funded by taking up to 12% off all payments to NI farmers.

Support

For the likes of the UFU, top-slicing payments to target money at one sector was a move they could not support.

However, if the slate is wiped clean, and only some of the money is going to be on land (a resilience-type payment), then it is a very different debate.

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Industry Insight: average EU coupled payment of €89/head

€1.7bn coupled payments for beef in 2017