Theories about the benefit of decoupling, or cutting any link between farm income support and the marketplace, have been echoing between university ivory towers for decades.

Decoupled programs, in order to avoid encouraging overproduction, require no commitment to produce. But this looks too much like charity for farmers, who only want a fair return for their labour and resources.

The Brussel’s bureaucracy has, however, managed to obtain support for a decoupled program – its Single Farm Payment scheme. Over the last decade, under the cover of trade policy, conservation and with the promise of reduced form filling, it has staged this backdoor entry. But without the market to arbitrate on how “to divi up the dosh,” the going has become difficult.

Two options were considered in Britain. Both seem to reward some farmers while short changing others. The “historic” method pays individual farmers what on average they received from the previous programs between 2000 and 2002. It is good for farmers who produced Common Agricultural Policy supported commodities. But not so for producers of potatoes, vegetables and such, which only indirectly benefitted from the European government’s largesse.

The second method, averaging payments within a region, creates the opposite problem. Those heavily dependent on more generous commodity payments, such as cow-calf operators, claim to be short changed.

To add to the confusion, Scotland and Wales have gone one way with historic payments, while England has opted to phase in average payments.

But this divergence is just the start. The debate is now widening as concerns mount about implications on whole sectors of agriculture and what that will mean for the countryside – something the populace cares much more about than it does about farmers.

We are now entering a world, where government will not only have to micro manage farmers to manage their fields to provide suitable habitat for twites, sky larks and such, but also to macro manage whole regions to ensure that there are still farmers available for micro managing.

European agriculture is in for some very uncertain times.

For CBC commentary, I'm David Walker, an agricultural economist, at Lodge Farm Postwick in Broadland Norfolk, England.

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