Final CAP post-2027 submission · Executive summary
Put public money where it protects the family farm, and put every price in the open.
Four Parts, several sectors and one consistent argument.
⬇ Download the complete submission (Word)
The next CAP should not try to preserve every existing payment simply because it already exists. It should decide what Irish agriculture is trying to protect, what outcomes public money should buy, and what failures cannot be solved by payments at all.
This submission starts from one principle:
Support should protect the family farm, reward measurable outcomes and never be used as a substitute for a fair market.
That principle runs through every proposal. It is why coupled support is front-loaded rather than flat. It is why the first 25 cows matter more than the 201st. It is why the finisher must be recognised alongside the breeder. It is why a retirement package should reward the transfer of land and a viable business rather than simply reward age. It is why sectors with little land-based support need transparency, enforceable contracts and collective bargaining more than another headage payment. And it is why every proposal in this submission has a named funding source or is clearly identified as a regulatory change.
The budget is smaller, so the choices must be clearer
If adopted in its proposed form, the European Commission's 2028–2034 financial framework could leave Ireland with a substantially smaller agricultural funding envelope. That does not make reform less necessary. It makes honest priorities more important.
A smaller budget cannot fund every old measure at the old rate while also financing every new idea. Any submission that pretends otherwise is not solving the problem. It is postponing it.
That is why this proposal does not make fixed euro promises. Payment rates would be calculated against the final allocation, the eligible population and the rules ultimately adopted. A smaller pot would mean smaller rates. It should not mean abandoning the structure. The order of priority would remain: protect the smaller active farm first; reward verified quality and performance; support genuine generational renewal; pay openly for public goods; and use regulation where the problem is market power rather than income support.
The coupled-support pot is spent once. It is not used again in every sector merely because another problem exists. That funding discipline is not a weakness in the submission. It is what makes the submission credible.
Part I — protect the family beef farm, but reward more than numbers
The suckler sector is overwhelmingly made up of small family farms. That reality should be reflected in the payment structure.
A flat payment per cow directs the same amount per head to the first cow and the 300th. It rewards scale without asking enough about fertility, health, genetic merit, calf performance or the value of the animal produced.
Part I proposes a different structure. The strongest payment would go to the first 25 eligible cows. Cows 26 to 100 would receive the standard rate. No payment would be made above the cap. Within that structure, the rate would scale against a limited set of independently verified breeding, health, fertility and performance measures.
The aim is not to punish particular breeds or production systems. It is to ensure that public money rewards cattle capable of producing a healthy calf, performing efficiently and creating value further along the chain.
The drystock finisher must also have a direct place in the scheme. A farmer buying weanlings and stores receives nothing from a cow payment, even though that farmer carries the animal through the final production stage. A separate finisher payment, linked to age at slaughter, specification, residency and market suitability, would recognise that contribution.
The breeder and finisher measures should work together. One rewards the production of a capable animal. The other rewards efficient and responsible finishing.
A grass-finished bonus would then recognise the system Ireland markets internationally, but only where there is genuine finishing-farm residency. Support should follow the farmer who carried the animal through the real finishing period, not merely the final owner before slaughter.
Part II — reward the movement, not the birthday
No payment system can renew agriculture if land and viable businesses do not move. Ireland has many older farmers who would reduce activity or retire if a dignified route existed. It also has trained younger farmers and new entrants unable to secure land, livestock or working capital.
The answer is not to force one generation out. It is to make voluntary transfer possible.
Part II proposes a fixed-term retirement and transfer package linked to real movement. The transfer could happen through sale, gift, succession or a qualifying long-term lease. The retiring farmer should be able to retain the home, an appropriate paddock and personal security. The payment should sit alongside the State pension rather than automatically work against it.
Higher support should apply where a viable business moves with the land. A functioning farm is more than hectares. It may include breeding stock, machinery, records, infrastructure, contracts, entitlements and established production capacity. A young entrant given bare land without finance or working capital has not been given a genuine start.
That is why the exit and entry sides must be designed together. Retirement support should be paired with establishment aid, finance, investment support, training and mentoring under whatever future EU and national framework is finally adopted.
The objective is not simply to change the name on a parcel. It is to move land, responsibility and opportunity.
Part III — support the sectors the payment system overlooks
Not every agricultural sector fits neatly into a land-based payment model. Forestry, sheep and wool, hills and commonage, pigs, poultry, farm energy and dairy-beef breeding all face different problems. They should not all receive the same answer.
- Forestry needs faster licensing, practical agroforestry and a support structure that does not unintentionally strengthen institutional land buying at the expense of active farm families.
- Sheep support should reward flock health, performance and quality through the appropriate rural-development or national funding route rather than spending the cattle coupled ceiling twice.
- Wool needs a visible weekly price, consistent grading, public procurement opportunities and processing capacity.
- Hill and commonage farmers should be paid for verified grazing, access, fire management and landscape maintenance.
- Pig and poultry producers need transparent prices and contract terms, alongside access to existing capital and energy supports.
- Farm energy should prioritise roofs, yards, existing structures and genuinely dual-use systems, with farmers offered more than a passive lease where larger projects are built on their land.
- The dairy-beef bridge should reward breeding choices that produce calves capable of becoming efficient, marketable beef animals.
The common mistake would be to answer each of these problems with another new payment. Part III does not do that. Some measures require targeted support. Others require better rules, better information or better use of programmes that already exist.
Part IV — horticulture and tillage need market power, not another promise
Tillage farmers and horticulture growers carry a particular imbalance. They buy seed, fertiliser, fuel, packaging, machinery, labour and finance at prices visible before production begins. They then sell into markets where contract terms, farm-gate prices, deductions, rejection rates and buyer margins may be largely private. They carry the weather risk, timing risk and quality risk between those two transactions.
A payment can help with income. It cannot by itself correct that bargaining imbalance.
Tillage needs rotation-linked support that rewards break crops, protein crops, soil cover and good management rather than simply paying for the presence of a crop. It also needs stronger contract rules. Where a buyer commits to a volume and the grower has already secured land and purchased inputs, a substantial late reduction should require notice, written justification and compensation where appropriate. Grain-market reporting should show contracted and spot prices, volumes, deductions and payment terms.
Horticulture needs written supply terms before the season, defined rejection standards, effective enforcement of Unfair Trading Practices rules and regular farm-gate-to-retail price reporting. Producer organisations should be actively developed so growers can plan, invest and negotiate together. Protected cropping, storage, packing and energy investment should be supported through existing capital measures, EU co-funding and private finance.
Labour must also be named honestly as a central constraint. A grant can improve a glasshouse or packing line. It cannot create a seasonal workforce by itself.
The common thread — publish the price
Across beef, sheep, wool, pigs, poultry, grain and fresh produce, the same problem keeps appearing. The buyer can see more of the market than the farmer. That information gap is not accidental background noise. It is commercial power.
Publishing prices does not guarantee a high price. It does not remove competition or market risk. It gives the farmer a factual starting point.
Milk-price publication has not destroyed the dairy market. It has made comparison possible. The same principle should apply elsewhere. Factories, processors, merchants, integrators and major buyers should not be able to treat ordinary market information as if it were a private favour.
A transparent market is not a controlled market. It is a market in which both sides can see enough to negotiate.
How the submission holds together
The four Parts are not separate wish lists. They divide problems according to the tool needed to solve them.
- Coupled support is used where maintaining production and directing money towards the family farm are legitimate public objectives.
- Generational-renewal funding is used for retirement, transfer and establishment.
- Rural-development, environmental and national funding are used for outcomes that belong there.
- Existing capital programmes and EU co-funding are used where investment is the answer.
- Private capital is used where commercial projects can pay their own way.
- Regulation is used where the problem is hidden prices, weak contracts or unequal bargaining power.
That is the discipline behind the submission: do not spend the same pot twice. Do not invent a payment where a rule would work better. Do not pay for numbers alone when public money can reward a real outcome.
The principle
The next CAP should not be judged by how many schemes it preserves. It should be judged by whether active family farms remain viable, whether land and opportunity move to the next generation, whether public goods are paid for openly, and whether farmers can see the market they are expected to trade in.
Support can keep a farm alive through a difficult period. It can reward quality, protect production capacity and help a new generation establish. But support cannot permanently compensate for a market in which the farmer negotiates blind.
That is why this submission has one principle running through every Part:
Protect the family farm — and publish the price.
That is the purpose of the proposal. It is also the purpose of IrelandCattlePrice.com.
Know what your farm produced? Put the price on the record.
This site exists so the price a farmer receives is visible — reported by farmers, where everyone can see it. The more farmers report, the harder the real trade is to hide.
Report your price Real farm-gate prices, reported by farmers.