This week is key for the majority of the Spanish agricultural sector and, above all, for the beneficiaries of the direct aid from the CAP. Tomorrow ends the term for the Spanish Agrarian Guarantee Fund (FEGA) to communicate through its website all the information related to the new rights, their amounts, the different regions, the redistributive payment and the supplements for young people and women by 2023; in short, to find out the amount of aid for this year. The next day, March 1, the period for applying for this aid will begin, which this year arrives a month behind the usual dates due to the application of the new CAP and the entry into force of the complicated rules that have been established. Among them, one stands out: as of 2023, all relations between the companies, the beneficiaries of the aid and the corresponding bodies of the different administrations must be carried out only electronically, which will complicate the procedures of a part of the farmers and ranchers. , especially the older ones, who do not handle the most modern communication systems well.
As LA RAZÓN has learned, those responsible for FEGA have decided to rush until the last moment to provide beneficiaries with all the information related to their aid and, except for last-minute surprises, these data will not be available until tomorrow. All in all, farmers and ranchers are going to have a very difficult time calculating to see if they will receive more or less money this year than in 2022 or 2023. First of all, we are faced with a new distribution of the funds that correspond to Spain in concept of direct aid. Secondly, the beneficiaries will be able to make a first approximation of the money they are going to receive in each of their farms, but only part of it. These are the concepts related to basic income support for sustainability with the rights, their amounts and the productive region in which they are located; They will also be able to know a part of the so-called redistributive payment, the amount of the payment to young farmers and the amount corresponding to the supplement for women. 77% of the total amount of the direct aid envelope is allocated to these concepts.
The other 23% refers to the so-called eco-regimes, which are voluntary. However, if the farmer or rancher does not take advantage of them, he will already lose a significant part of the aid he received last year; but, if he decides to put them into practice, he will have some additional production expenses that may not compensate him. In any case, and except for last-minute changes, those responsible for FEGA plan to include in the information that they will provide a kind of custom calculator, which allows a first estimate of the money that the beneficiary would receive in this way. However, this calculation is theoretical because the final total amount will depend on the number of farmers and ranchers that take advantage of a certain eco-regime, since the budget of each of them is limited and there could be reductions or increases in relation to the figure that they provide from the FEGA.
This is a team maneuver Luis Planas to avoid that each farmer or rancher, when making his first calculation, sees that there is a significant difference between the total amount of money he received last year and in 2021, and the amounts of this year. It is possible that in many cases there will be significant reductions, with the consequent discomfort of those affected, just before the municipal and regional ones.