The main pressure from agriculture that puts the achievement of the Directive's objective of “good status” at risk is the impacts from nutrients (phosphates and nitrates), pesticides, water abstraction for agriculture etc. The new EU Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) has amplified the opportunities to support farmers in addressing environmental matters and the idea is that CAP will help achieve the WFD objectives. First, however, what needs to be done is to get practical examples and information about the overall nature and scale of the agricultural pressure in Europe in order to estimate to what degree measures such as CAP will contribute to delivering the WFD objectives.

A draft mandate produced by the UK and the Commission has lead to the set-up of a Strategic Steering Group under CIS to address this. The first meeting will take place in April 2005, and the aim of the group's work will be to identify the issues which affect a MS's ability to meet WFD objectives as a result of pressure from agriculture. The group will also put forward suggestions for how to best manage the risk of not meeting these objectives taking into account the opportunities of the reformed CAP. In 2005 the focus will be on preparation of Rural Development programmes, and the Commission is asking Member States and other stakeholders to provide examples of successful Rural Development measures.