Managing food supply: strategies to control the level and nature of

productionCommon Agricultural Policy (CAP)

Starter: Re-CAP!

The CAP in a nutshell… discuss with your partner:• Why, when and who by was the CAP established• What its aims were• What strategies were in place to achieve them

• To know the effects of the CAP, and recognise the advantages and disadvantages it created.

• To describe how and why the CAP was reformed.

Learning objectives

• The CAP’s policies increased European food supply.• European farmers were happy to overproduce!

The effects of the CAP

Study the information boxes on your sheet. Create a colour-key and code the boxes according to whether they were an advantage or disadvantage

of the CAP.

• By the 1990s there was increasing concern over both the running and the effects of the CAP.

• In 1992 radical reforms were introduced to the system.

• Aimed to encourage the de-intensification of farming and the protection of the environment.

CAP reforms

1. Subsidies to dairy and livestock farmers were reduced - farmers were no longer encouraged to produce as many animals.

2. Growers of low quality produce, such as wine and olive oil, were paid to reduce the areas under crop and to increase the quality of their produce from remaining areas.

3. The guaranteed prices the EU would pay for cereals, beef and milk were reduced and became much closer to real world market prices.

CAP reforms

4. Arable farmers were paid to set-aside up to 10% of their land and not grow crops on it.

5. Domestic quotas were introduced, particularly in diary farming.

CAP reforms

Study pages 224-5 in your text book.Create a timeline to summarise the CAP reforms from 1992

Prep