GAEC standard 1, listed in Annex III to Regulation (EU) 2021/2115, aims to maintain permanent grasslands in order to preserve carbon stock based on a ratio of permanent grassland in relation to agricultural area at national, regional, subregional, group-of-holdings or holding level in comparison to the reference year 2018, with a maximum decrease of 5 % compared to the reference year. Structural changes to farms that might occur during the programming period 2023-2027, in particular in the livestock sector, could be accompanied by rapid changes in land use at the farm level, in particular to mitigate the impacts of climate change on feed and fodder availability. Such structural changes might, however, only show up in the available data after a delay. Such evolution of structural changes to farms could lead to variations in the annual ratio of permanent grasslands compared to the reference year 2018. In view of these variations and with a view to facilitating the implementation of GAEC standard 1, the maximum percentage of the decrease of the ratio of permanent grassland compared to the reference year 2018 should be increased to 10 % in order to enable the Member States to take into account the developments during the programming period 2023-2027 and needs of farms, in particular in the livestock sector.
Text as published in the Official Journal, reproduced verbatim (including any typographical quirks of the source). For the authentic version, see EUR-Lex.
