The study discusses the agri-environment scheme, which gained a high position in the process of integration of environmental protection in the framework of the CAP. The purpose of the payments was to encourage farmers to protect and improve the environment. The farmers were required to apply environmentally friendly techniques and practices for a period of fi ve years. Received payments had additional reimbursement of extra costs and decreased income resulting from the application of environment-friendly practices. Agrienvironmental scheme was realized through packages and variants, whose number diff ered in time. In 2004–2006, agrienvironmental scheme included approximately 70 thousand of agricultural holdings, which labored on the surface of the 1.4 million ha. In the next programming period (2007–2013) the benefi ciaries submitted 448,6 thousand applications, and the level of payment amounted to PLN 6.7 billion. The program of the current fi nancial perspective (2014–2020) includes 2058,9 thousand ha of agricultural land, as compared to the total area of agricultural land in the country in the amount of 14609 ha of agricultural land represents 14.1%