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ARABLE AREA PAYMENTS SCHEME 2003
APPENDIX 2 SMALL PRODUCERS
1. Small producers are those who claim on an area no greater than that required to produce 92 tonnes of crops at the historic reference yields used for making AAPS payments. They receive the same rates of payment as other claimants but are not required to set aside any land.
2. The maximum area that can be claimed by small producers is 17.66 hectares in the Scottish LFA and 16.23 hectares in the Scottish non-LFA .
3. If you wish to calculate whether the area on which you intend to claim is subject to obligatory set-aside, you should:
(i) multiply the area claimed (in hectares) by
5.67 (non-LFA)
5.21 (LFA)
(ii) add together the resulting figures for all areas claimed.
If the total figure that results is less than or equal to 92, there is no obligation to set aside any land. If the figure is greater than 92, then at least the obligatory percentage of land must be set aside to ensure full payment of the claimed cropping area.
N.B. The historical reference yields used above are for Scotland. Small producers claiming on land in more than one yield region should refer to Appendix 5.
4. You may submit a claim with too much land to qualify as a small producer, but with no set-aside land or insufficient set-aside land to meet the obligatory requirement. In such cases, the local Area Office will scale back your claim. There is no penalty where claims are scaled back in this way. The claim will be scaled back either by the reduction of the cropped area claimed to that supported by the area of eligible set-aside in the claim, or to the equivalent to the 92 tonnes limit, whichever is the greater. In scaling back claims, the area of each crop claimed will be reduced in proportion to the areas originally claimed.
5. Small producers can set aside land on a voluntary basis. The area of any such set-aside should be treated as an area of crops for the purpose of calculating the area that can be claimed without obligatory set-aside. Voluntary set-aside can also be scaled back where necessary, and must comply with the normal set-aside rules.
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