The Farming Regulation Task Force, headed up by Richard Macdonald, reported back to Defra last week, with a report containing more than 200 recommendations and proposals to cut red tape.
A summary of the report can be found on the right hand side. This also highlights some of the recommendations the NFU can broadly agree with.
In responding to the report Jim Paice has said that he can accept some of the recommendations immediately. These include the recommendations for reducing the paperwork required under the Nitrates Regulations and moving towards all pig and cattle movement online. He also announced the creation of a new Strategic Regulatory Scrutiny Panel, tasked with challenging and advising Defra on the way they think about regulation. He also stated that in the longer term a priority will be to cut the unnecessary paperwork that farmers and food producers have to deal with and where possible, move remaining paperwork online.
Other areas where early action will be explored include:
- Applying the principle of simplifying and removing duplication to animal welfare inspections;
- Finding ways of improving record-keeping on farms in NVZs, for example by exempting organic farmers from record-keeping requirements;
- Changing aspects of the six day standstill arrangements so that they will no longer apply to animals moving directly between farms;
- Rationalising the allocation of County Parish Holding numbers (CPH), the system by which individual holdings are identified and allocated to farmers, so that the same rules apply to all species;
- Moving away from paper-based movement reporting for sheep, through the introduction of an industry-owned database; and
- Abolishing the Cattle Tracing System (CTS) links and Sole Occupancy Agreements (SOAs) which provide specific exemptions to movement reporting and six day standstill for farm animals, but add unnecessary complications to an already complex system
Defra have also confirmed that an initial response from the Government to the Task Force recommendations will be published in the autumn with a full and final response early in 2012.
- dick lindley - 04/06/2011
Exempting organic farmers from NVZ regulations is insane - why benifit a system of agriculture which is outdated and inefficient? Madness is the only way to describe this recommendation...