Assessment of CAP support on organic farming

Evaluations of CAP support on organic farming often focus on environmental and climate effects, while economic effects receive less attention.

As there is no specific legal requirement for evaluating organic farming, the EU CAP Network, supported by the European Evaluation Helpdesk for the CAP, is launching the Thematic Working Group ''Assessment of CAP support to organic farming: economic aspects''.

The objective is to help Managing Authorities and evaluators make better use of available data to assess aspects such as: the profitability of organic farming, value-chain effects and other economic aspects; to address a lack of data; and to improve comparability of evaluation results across the EU.

This work takes into account the European Court of Auditors’ Special Report 19/2024, which called for better assessment of CAP funding’s contribution to the economic sustainability of organic farming and improved availability of relevant data.

The guidelines will follow two complementary evaluation tracks: one on the farm-level performance of CAP support and one on the wider economic and societal effects. A key focus will be on shaping the evaluation scope and framework tailored to different Member States' contexts and applying appropriate methods to strengthen analysis.

It will also tackle persistent methodological challenges, such as constructing credible and workable counterfactuals, addressing selection bias and strengthening attribution. At the same time, the guidance will highlight ways to close data gaps,  such as the representativeness of organic farms in the Farm Accountancy Data Network (FADN) and strengthening the availability of market data.

The insights gathered from Managing Authorities, Paying Agencies and evaluators during a dedicated Good Practice Workshop in autumn 2026 will also feed into the final guidelines.