Have Your Say on Cutting Red Tape
Richard Macdonald, Farming Regulation Task Force Chair, said “The Task Force has been charged with finding ways to completely change the culture of regulation and our consultation has already identified a number of priority issues. But we want to be absolutely sure that these are based on the real world of agriculture and food processing – to do this we need ideas and suggestions from people who experience this red tape every day and they only have until 31 October to tell us.”
“This is your chance to influence how regulation impacts on farmers – so please seize the opportunity with both hands.”
Priority issues identified by the Task Force include: cross-compliance, the EU Fruit & Vegetable regime, livestock identification and movement requirements; dairy hygiene inspections and meat hygiene controls. But there are others that industry is beginning to identify.
One recurring theme is the inspections regime that all farmers and food producers face, for example:
- the inspection regime for cross compliance under the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) is seen as complex, disproportionate and inflexible. It involves up to three inspection visits and several Government inspectorates to assess whether a farmer is compliant with all the environment and other standards a farmer must meet;
- the inspection and audit programmes for central Government inspectors, local authority inspectors and private sector often overlap. In particular farmers mention repeat inspections of animal identification and movement records; and
- dairy hygiene inspections are just one example where assessment is duplicated by official inspectors and private sector audit.
Defra has published guidance for the vet sector ahead of a proposed UK-EU Sanitary and Phytosanitary agreement.
