The European Commission has proposed to convert the Farm Accountancy Data Network (FADN) into a Farm Sustainability Data Network (FSDN), allowing to better address sustainability challenges thanks to increased data knowledge on EU agriculture.
The FADN is a unique source of microeconomic and accountancy data coming every year from more than 80 000 EU farms. It monitors farms’ income and business activities to understand the impact of the measures taken under the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). It has allowed assessing farms’ economic and financial situations since 1965. This data is instrumental for economic analyses on EU agriculture, as well as for supporting sound evidence-based policy-making.
Reflecting the CAP’s evolution towards more environmental and social policies, the future FSDN will add sustainability data on environmental and social matters to its well-established economic scope. In addition to collecting new data, the system will be modernised to increase data sharing. This will make it possible to provide additional information for advisory services and feedback to farmers with the aim to improve the agricultural holdings’ sustainability.
Read the Proposal for a Regulation and the press release of the European Commission.