Concern over CAP reforms for set-aside

ShootingUK is the complete shooting resource for the British shooting community. From shotgun licence and shotgun certificate information to gun reviews, game shooting, clay shooting and more.

Home
News

| Next

Concern over CAP reforms for set-aside

Set-aside land is seen as an excellent refuge for
scores of creatures in the countryside.

Friday, 22 June 2007

The Game Conservancy Trust (GCT) has voiced concern over the effect reforms to the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) could have on set-aside land.

SPEAKING TO POLICY-MAKERS and parliamentarians at Westminster in May, the GCT and the Campaign to Protect Rural England (CRE) argued for the inclusion of set-aside in new agri-environment schemes, and said the conservation benefits of set-aside should not be lost.

The GCT is also concerned farmers will have less of an incentive to retain set-aside land, in the face of improved grain prices and the increasing popularity of oilseed rape as bio-fuel. The GCT proposes a substitute set-aside be created, and the bulk of it developed as field scale conservation land.

Dr Stephen Tapper, director of policy and public affairs at the GCT, said: "CAP is under review, with the possibility of removing Pillar 1. But attached to this is set-aside land, which represents 482,000 hectares or 5% of all agricultural land. The GCT has turned it into one by developing measures such as special wild bird seed mixtures and it has become a superb refuge for creatures such as brown hares, field mice, bats and songbirds."