Regulation (EU) No 1305/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 17 December 2013 on support for rural development by the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development (EAFRD) and repealing Council Regulation (EC) No 1698/2005

This Regulation lays down general rules governing Union support for rural development, financed by the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development ("the EAFRD") and established by Regulation (EU) No 1306/2013. It sets out the objectives to which rural development policy is to contribute and the relevant Union priorities for rural development. It outlines the strategic context for rural development policy and defines the measures to be adopted in order to implement rural development policy. In addition, it lays down rules on programming, networking, management, monitoring and evaluation on the basis of responsibilities shared between the Member States and the Commission and rules to ensure coordination of the EAFRD with other Union instruments.

This Regulation complements the provisions of Part Two of Regulation (EU) No 1303/2013 of the European Parliament and the Council⁽¹⁾.

For the purposes of this Regulation, the definitions of "programme", "operation", "beneficiary", "community-led local development strategy", "public expenditure", "SMEs", "completed operation" and "financial instruments" as laid down or referred to in Article 2 and of "less developed regions" and "transition regions" as laid down in points (a) and (b) in Article 90(2) of Regulation (EU) No 1303/2013 apply.

In addition, the following definitions shall apply:

1. "programming": means the process of organisation, decision making and allocation of financial resources in several stages, with the involvement of partners, intended to implement, on a multi-annual basis, joint action by the Union and the Member States to achieve the Union priorities for rural development.

2. "region" means a territorial unit corresponding to level 1 or 2 of the Nomenclature of territorial units for statistics (NUTS level 1 and 2) within the meaning of Regulation (EC) No 1059/2003 of the European Parliament and of the Council⁽²⁾;

3. "measure" means a set of operations contributing to one or more of the Union priorities for rural development;

4. "support rate" means the rate of public contribution to an operation;

5. "transaction cost" means an additional cost linked to fulfilling a commitment, but not directly attributable to its implementation or not included in the costs or income foregone that are compensated directly; and which can be calculated on a standard cost basis;

6. "agricultural area" means any area taken up by arable land, permanent grassland and permanent pasture or permanent crops as defined in Article 4 of Regulation (EU) No 1307/2013;

7. "economic losses" means any additional cost incurred by a farmer as a result of exceptional measures taken by the farmer with the objective of reducing supply on the market concerned or any substantial loss of production;

8. "adverse climatic event" means weather conditions, such as frost, storms and hail, ice, heavy rain or severe drought, which can be assimilated to a natural disaster;

9. "animal diseases" means diseases mentioned in the list of animal diseases established by the World Organisation for Animal Health or in the Annex to Council Decision 2009/470/EC⁽³⁾;

10. "environmental incident" means a specific occurrence of pollution, contamination or degradation in the quality of the environment which is related to a specific event and is of limited geographical scope; but does not cover general environmental risks not connected with a specific event, such as climate change or atmospheric pollution;

11. "natural disaster": means a naturally occurring event of a biotic or abiotic nature that leads to important disturbances in agricultural production systems or forest structures, eventually causing important economic damage to the farming or forestry sectors;

12. "catastrophic event": means an unforeseen event of a biotic or abiotic nature caused by human action that leads to important disturbances in agricultural production systems or forest structures, eventually causing important economic damage to the farming or forestry sectors;

13. "short supply chain": means a supply chain involving a limited number of economic operators, committed to co-operation, local economic development, and close geographical and social relations between producers, processors and consumers;

14. "young farmer" means a person who is no more than 40 years of age at the moment of submitting the application, possesses adequate occupational skills and competence and is setting up for the first time in an agricultural holding as head of that holding; the setting up may be done solely or jointly with other farmers, irrespective of its legal form;

15. "thematic objectives": means the thematic objectives defined in Article 9 of Regulation (EU) No 1303/2013;

16. "Common Strategic Framework" ("CSF")": means the Common Strategic Framework referred to in Article 10 of Regulation (EU) No 1303/2013;

17. "cluster" means a grouping of independent undertakings, including start-ups, small, medium and large undertakings as well as advisory bodies and/or research organisations - designed to stimulate economic/ innovative activity by promoting intensive interactions, the sharing of facilities and the exchange of knowledge and expertise, as well as contributing effectively to knowledge transfer, networking and information dissemination among the undertakings in the cluster;

18. "forest" means an area of land spanning more than 0,5 hectares with trees higher than 5 meters and a canopy cover of more than 10 percent, or trees able to reach these thresholds in situ; and does not include land that is predominantly under agricultural or urban land use, subject to paragraph 2;

19. "date of setting up" means the date when the applicant performs or completes (an) action(s) related to the setting up referred to in point (n).

A Member State or region may choose to apply a forest definition, other than the one in point (r) of paragraph 1, based on existing national law or inventory system. The Member States or regions shall provide such definition in the rural development programme;

In order to ensure a coherent approach in the treatment of beneficiaries and to take into account the need for an adaptation period, as regards the definition of young farmer laid down in paragraph 1(n), the Commission shall be empowered to adopt delegated acts in accordance with Article 83 concerning the conditions under which a legal person may be considered to be a 'young farmer', and the setting of a grace period for the acquisition of occupational skills.