Tag: CAP

Battered by criticism and widespread ridicule, the European Commission on Thursday (23 May) reversed its decision to ban refillable bottles of olive oil from restaurants. Europe's leading farm groups, however, swiftly denounced the change as a defeat for consumers.

Monsanto’s “Bee Summits” and Bayer AG’s “Bee care centre” are the latest examples of how pesticide makers are competing to showcase their goodwill to policymakers in Europe and the US that they are taking the necessary steps to protect bee populations. The companies say their pesticides are not the problem, but critics say science shows the opposite.

Unless there is substantial movement on greening measures and other critical issues in the still-evolving Common Agricultural Policy for 2014-2020, the objective of creating a new purpose and rationale for the CAP is sliding into the sand, argues David Baldock.

EXCLUSIVE / Leaders of the EU and their partners in the G8 nations are under mounting pressure to reconsider their support for biofuel targets amid concern that plant oil production competes with food output in poor countries.

The Pesticide Action Network has accused the German chemicals company BASF of buying credibility for industry views within academia, after one of its employee was offered a professorship at Wageningen University in the Netherlands.

A majority of EU countries have supported a European Commission proposal to temporarily ban three pesticides suspected of harming bees in a vote on Monday (29 April).

SPECIAL REPORT / Developing nations that are struggling with food supply uncertainty and malnutrition increasingly face a health challenge that is all too well known in Europe: obesity.

In an acknowledgement that agricultural policy has been knocked off course by prolonged deal-making, the European Commission on Thursday (18 April) announced plans for a year-long transition to give farmers and administrators time to implement the still-undecided policies.

Up to 5% of European Union products labelled as beef contain horsemeat, according to results published by the European Commission yesterday (16 April).

Three leading European chocolate companies have come bottom of an environmental impact ranking of candy Easter eggs based on their palm oil content, a new survey shows.

Dacian Cioloş is stuck between a rock and a hard place over the Common Agricultural Policy he first proposed. He will need to show extraordinary resolve to overcome a possible travesty of democracy in the upcoming trialogue, argue Ariel Brunner and Pieter de Pous.

With a far broader range of stakeholders than in former times and more decisionmaking power for the European Parliament, there was hope that the CAP debate would lead to reforms that would meet the current and coming challenges for agriculture. Yet the EU could be on course for a disappointing outcome, say Cordula Rutz and Jörg Schramek.

Agriculture ministers meeting in Brussels on Tuesday (19 March) forged an incomplete compromise farm policy ahead of key negotiations on the future of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), with Slovakia and Slovenia refusing to sign off on the deal.

Food safety, GMO cultivation and France’s cherished “cultural exception” for audiovisual services are non-negotiable areas in view of upcoming EU-US free trade talks, the French stressed. The message was apparently well received by the European Commission in Brussels.

Butter mountains and milk lakes. Those were the images invoked in the European Parliament this week by opponents of extending vineyard planting limits and protections for sugar beet farmers.

MEPs exercised their power to shape agricultural policy for the first time on Wednesday (13 March), voting to adopt a controversial package of legislation that now faces a fresh round of negotiations with national leaders. EurActiv reports from Strasbourg.

Bowing to criticism that it was “undemocratic”, the European Parliament’s agriculture committee agreed Monday night (11 March) to allow the full house to vote on hundreds of amendments to the EU’s future farm policy, many of them aimed at reversing the panel’s earlier decisions. EurActiv reports from Strasbourg.

In a sudden decision that has angered international development groups, the European Parliament’s agriculture committee has been handed special power to pare down hundreds of amendments to the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) on the eve of a vote Tuesday (12 March) by the full Assembly. EurActiv reports from Strasbourg.

European Commission President José Manuel Barroso on Tuesday (5 March) strongly defended the EU's response to the horsemeat scandal that has shaken consumer confidence and, more broadly, could have repercussions for international trade.

The Commissioner for health and consumer affairs tells EurActiv that the horsemeat scandal should be seen for what it is: a fraud rather than a flaw in the regulation. He favours introducing tougher penalties for such incidents, but believes food labelling should be kept as a separate issue.

With negotiations on the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) moving towards an end-game, it is not too late to forge a deal that will help European farmers and the environment, argues Tony Long.

The European Commission’s sugar management committee has authorised the import of 584,000 tonnes of white sugar since January, nearly half the amount the EU is projected to approve this year, adding fuel to calls for the EU to scrap its longstanding protection of the domestic sugar market.

Food and beverage companies are lining up against a proposal to extend the EU's sugar quota to 2020, reversing an earlier agreement to phase it out by 2015. A vote in the European Parliament is scheduled later this month. The procurement chief for one of Europe’s biggest food companies tells EurActiv that extending protections for sugar is bad for consumers, businesses and the environment.