Fianna Fáil MEP Barry Cowen wants the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) to go back to its roots.

“I’d like to see the CAP go back to its roots. It’s to supplement farm income, it’s dedicated towards food production,” he told the Irish Farmers Journal at Tullamore Show on Sunday.

“It has deviated somewhat from that in recent times with the advance of various environmental and eco schemes, which of course are appreciated and necessary and are part of the sustainable move that is under way.

“I’d be very anxious that new schemes of that nature be separate and distinct from [the] CAP, with extra and adequate funding put in place to assist that area,” he said.

Practices

This would be to accommodate new farm practices, new schemes and new rules which people are adamant they can and will make, but only in a way which rewards them rather than the costs forgone metric that people have become accustomed to in recent times, he said.

He said that this metric hasn’t advanced the sustainable project in the manner in which we’d like to see it move.

When asked if he would like to see a farm retirement scheme set up under Minister for Agriculture Charlie McConalogue’s new commission on generational renewal in farming, Cowen said it could “well be part of the process”.