Onions growing in a Suffolk field. Photo Workers.
“[the Common Agricultural Policy] is still a fundamentally flawed design.
Paying land owners for the amount of agricultural land they have is unjust, inefficient and drives perverse outcomes. It gives the most from the public purse to those who have the most private wealth.
It bids up the price of land, distorting the market, creating a barrier to entry for innovative new farmers and entrenching lower productivity.
Indeed, perversely, it rewards farmers for sticking to methods of production that are resource-inefficient and also incentivises an approach to environmental stewardship which is all about mathematically precise field margins and not truly ecologically healthy landscapes.”
Michael Gove speaking at the Oxford Farming Conference in January 2018
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