Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine Martin Heydon will attend an event next month on the future of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP).

The event, titled 'CAP to 2030 and Beyond' is organised by the Irish Farmers' Association (IFA) and will be held at the Killashee Hotel in Naas, Co. Kildare on Tuesday, May 13, from 8:00pm.

Minister Heydon is set to open the event, which will feature a number of other speakers, including:

Elli Tsiforou, secretary general of Copa Cogeca, the EU farmer and agricultural co-operative representative group;
Tassos Haniotis, former director of strategy and policy analysis at the European Commission's Directorate-General for Agriculture;
Tadhg Buckley, IFA chief economist and director of policy;
Liam MacHale, IFA director of European affairs.

Commenting ahead of the meeting, IFA president Francie Gorman said: "The next CAP faces challenges the like of which we have never seen before, due primarily to geo-political challenges.

“The IFA believes that the CAP has to be properly funded and must focus on supporting food production. That was its primary ambition when it was founded. However, trying to meet too many objectives has diluted the core aim of the CAP and its value to farmers," he added.

The IFA president said: "The policy framework that determines how CAP works for farming in Ireland is critical to the future of the sector. This event will look at the background to CAP and the current issues that will be part of the negotiations that will play out between now and the end of 2026."

Gorman noted that Ireland will hold the presidency of the Council of the EU during the second half of 2026, which, he said, will be a crucial time period for the talks.

Pre-registration is required to attend next month's event.

The IFA event comes amid renewed concerns that the next CAP could see its two pillars - Pillar I and Pillar II - merged into one fund.

Copa Cogeca has written an open letter to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, saying that the proposal to merge the two pillars would be a “historic misstep”.

In a letter to President von der Leyen this week, Copa said it is “profoundly alarmed” by the possibility of the two CAP pillars being merged.

"Such a shift represents a fundamental change to the governance of the next [EU budget] and would severely undermine the CAP,” Copa said.