The Rural Payments Agency has announced that over 54,000 farmers in England received their 2017 Basic Payment Scheme (BPS) money over the first few days of the payment window.
Payments between 1 - 6 December were made to over 63% of eligible claimants, worth £850 million, according to the RPA.
These include a range of 2017 BPS claim types and sizes, as well as those inspected and farmers with common land.
Thanks to increased entitlement values and greening rates, coupled with the favourable BPS exchange rate confirmed in September, basic payments will be worth 25% more on average this year, compared to 2015.
The RPA said it remains focused on processing payments as quickly as possible.
RPA Chief Executive, Paul Caldwell said: “We are making strong progress against last year’s performance and remain focused on getting remaining payments out as quickly as possible, as I understand how important they are for farmers.
The National Farmers' Union has said the RPA must pay over 90 percent of BPS claims by the end of December as uncertainty has surfaced over the agency's effectiveness of getting payments out on time.
It follows news of the chief executive of the RPA publicly acknowledging the agency's shortcomings on how it manages farm support payments.
