There are around 20 million hectares of agroforestry (Figure 1). Close to 90% of the European grassland area could include silvopasture practices and more than 99% of the European arable land could have silvoarable practices. These figures show the huge potential of agroforestry in Europe.
Figure 1. Percentage of land of the main agroforestry practices in Europe: silvopasture, homegardens, silvoarable and Riparian buffer strips
Most of the current agroforestry practices are placed in the south of Europe (Map 1) and that most of the agroforestry practices are silvopastoralism (Figure 2) (Mosquera-Losada et al.2016).
Figure 2: Current percentage of agroforestry practices in Europe (Multipurpose silvopasture means silvopasture with fruit trees and Multipurpose silvoarable means silvoarable agroforestry practice with fruit trees) (Mosquera-Losada et al. 2016).
Current CAP Pillar I has not promoted agroforestry in an adequate way, but this situation has been improved with the Omnibus regulation. There is a clear need of simplification between cross-compliance, Pillar I and Pillar II activities when promoting agroforestry (Landscape features) and to consider tree density limit as mature trees. There is a need to ensure Pillar I payments on lands that received Pillar II agroforestry measure (8.2) funds to establish agroforestry areas. Pillar II payments should be ensured to all type of lands (agriculture and forestry) in a unique measure. The Omnibus regulation launched at the end of 2017 has improved the measure 8.2 in those areas that already have agroforestry, as measure 8.2 can be used to improve already existing agroforestry and not only for new established lands. Article 23 is amended as follows: Measure 8.2. is now under the new name of Article 23 ‘Article 23 Establishment, regeneration or renovation of agroforestry systems’ and indicates that shall cover the costs of establishment, regeneration and/or renovation and an annual premium per hectare to cover the costs of maintenance for a maximum period of five years.’
A set of recommendations for the current CAP that may be useful in the next CAP could be seen in the AGFORWARD policy report participated by EURAF presented at the European Commission and European Parliament headquarters in Brussels at the end of 2017 that can be seen in the following link.
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