The Farmers' Union of Wales has welcomed the Welsh Assembly Government's acceptance of the bulk of recommendations by the independent group's review of the controversial Glastir agri-environment scheme but raised concerns that the part acceptance of some options and the seeming lack of urgency about an urgent review of the payment rates will reduce the flexibility of the scheme to future applicants.
FUW president Gareth Vaughan said the union was disappointed that some of the group's recommendations which would have introduced a greater degree of flexibility into the scheme had been rejected wholly or in part although there is much to welcome.
"We are genuinely concerned that the main opportunities provided by the package of 69 recommendations put together by Rees Roberts' review group, which represented a way of making the scheme more attractive to farmers, could be jeopardized due to delays in reviewing the costings.
"Until the costings more accurately reflect reality, the scheme is not going to be that attractive to farmers. We now fear that the costings exercise, which was considered urgent by the group, is going to take a while to complete.
"We are also disappointed that the opportunity to re-visit the all-important LFA element of the scheme has only been accepted in part."