Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) No 809/2014Show full title

Article 38 Area measurement

1. While all agricultural parcels shall be subject to eligibility checks, the actual area measurement of the agricultural parcel as part of an on-the-spot check may be limited to a randomly selected sample of at least 50 % of the agricultural parcels for which an aid application and/or payment claim has been submitted under the area-related aid schemes and/or rural development measures. When this sample check reveals any non-compliance, all agricultural parcels shall be measured, or conclusions from the measured sample shall be extrapolated.

The first subparagraph shall not apply to agricultural parcels to be checked for the purpose of ecological focus area in accordance with Article 46 of Regulation (EU) No 1307/2013.

2. Agricultural parcel areas shall be measured by any means proven to assure measurement of quality at least equivalent to that required by applicable technical standards, as drawn up at Union level.

3. The competent authority may make use of remote sensing in accordance with Article 40 and Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) techniques where possible.

4. A single value buffer tolerance shall be defined for all area measurements performed using GNSS and/or ortho-imagery. For this purpose the measurement tools used shall be validated for at least one validation class of buffer tolerance below the single value. However, the single tolerance value shall not exceed 1.25 m.

The maximum tolerance with regard to each agricultural parcel shall not, in absolute terms, exceed 1.0 ha.

However, for the measures referred to in Article 21(1)(a) and Articles 30 and 34 of Regulation (EU) No 1305/2013 as far as the forestry area is concerned, Member States may define appropriate tolerances, which shall in no case be greater than twice the tolerance set out in the first subparagraph of this paragraph.

5. The total area of an agricultural parcel may be taken into account in the measurement provided that it is fully eligible. In other cases the net eligible area shall be taken into account. For that purpose, the pro-rata system as referred to in Article 10 of Delegated Regulation (EU) No 640/2014 may be applied, where appropriate.

6. For the purpose of the calculation of shares of different crops for crop diversification as referred to in Article 44 of Regulation (EU) No 1307/2013, the area actually covered by one crop in accordance with Article 40(2) of Delegated Regulation (EU) No 639/2014 shall be taken into account for the measurement. On areas where mixed cropping is applied, the total area covered with mixed cropping in accordance with the first and the second subparagraphs of Article 40(3) of that Regulation or covered with a mixed crop in accordance with the third subparagraph of Article 40(3) of that Regulation shall be taken into account.

7. Where Article 17(1)(b) of Delegated Regulation (EU) No 640/2014 may lead to an artificial division of the area of adjacent agricultural parcels with a homogeneous land cover type into separate agricultural parcels, the measurement of this area of adjacent agricultural parcels with a homogeneous land cover type shall be combined in one single measurement of the agricultural parcels concerned.

8. Where appropriate, two separate measurements shall be carried out on the agricultural parcel for the purpose of the basic payment scheme or the single area payment scheme in accordance with Chapter 1 of Title III of Regulation (EU) No 1307/2013 and a spatially different overlapping agricultural parcel for the purpose of the remaining area-related aid schemes and/or rural development measures, where appropriate.