Płatności bezpośrednie a sytuacja ekonomiczna gospodarstw rolniczych*

The direct subventions following the Mc Sharry’s reforms introduced to compensate the cuts of guaranteed prices concerned the basic agricultural products. They make a financial support for the land production as the first pillar of the Common Agriculture Policy. The standard system of direct subsidies is operative within the UE-15 countries. As far as the newcomers are concerned, the simplified one has been provided temporarily. The latter involves every farmer with the ground area larger than 1 hectare. The first payments under this system were implemented in 2004. This paper is an approach to detect an influence of the direct subventions on the economic position of land holdings. The importance of direct subsidies has been found to be dependent on the arable land area. In small farms, the subsidies serve the purpose of social support. They constitute more than 85% of agricultural income. The owners of large farmland acreage got more considerable benefits out of the subsidies. In farms of Podlasie province and Kujawy and Pomerania one, respectively, a mean share of direct subsidies in the agricultural income was 46.5% and 38%.