Farming subsidies are not just for farmers these days

A Warwickshire amateur dramatic society bought scenery and even a laptop for lighting with CAP money

The Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) is changing once again.

First of all, farmers are going to see subsidies cut, although the strength of the pound against the euro might slightly cushion the blow.

They're also going to see more cash diverted from farming into other rural projects. Most of that will be for environmental grants but in the past we've also seen CAP cash used for Staffordshire well dressing and a Warwickshire amateur dramatic society.

Track the cash

There are a couple of useful online tools that allow you to see where money from the £49bn CAP budget ends up.

If you want to see what farmers and others are getting you can use this useful Defra website. It allows you to search by name, postcode and even the size of the grant.

If you want to see some of the non-farming grants funded by CAP money you can find them all here.

What's really interesting is seeing how some counties like Warwickshire do really well at getting hold of this cash for non-farming projects while Herefordshire and Worcestershire do relatively poorly.

Is there really less demand for grants in these areas or are the people of Warwickshire a bit better at playing the system? Something that could be a worry with increasing amounts of CAP money being diverted in this direction.

Finally, here's a really good article from BBC News on everything you ever wanted to know about the CAP.