Tag: direct payments

High commodity prices have made European farmers much less dependent on farm subsidies, offering debt-laden countries a unique opportunity to reform the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), a new report published yesterday (5 October) by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) has concluded.

The Dutch State Secretary for European Affairs Atzo Nicolaï has warned that EU enlargement could fail if Member States do not agree to phase out direct payments to farmers.

The European Parliament's Agriculture Committee has backed the Commission's proposal to gradually introduce farm subsidies to the future EU Member States over a period of 10 years.

EU policy makers and farmers organisations have expressed concerns that the new US Farm Bill will endanger WTO trade liberalisation talks on agriculture.

The EU farm ministers are meeting informally in Murcia (Spain) from 27 to 30 April to discuss the Presidency's policy paper on rural development. Rural development is seen as the second pillar of the Common Agriculture Policy.

EU Agriculture Commissioner, Franz Fischler, underlined the benefits of the Commission's proposal for the enlargement negotiations on agriculture in an address to the Farm Ministers of the 13 candidate countries.

The German Agriculture Minister, Renate Künast, has called for a reform of the Common Agricultural Policy to reduce direct support for production, increase support for rural development and introduce national co-financing.

COPA and COGECA, the largest farmers' organisations in the EU, have called for the preservation of the Common Agricultural Policy that is under pressure for a thorough reform because of the enlargement and WTO talks.

The debate on the EU agricultural policy reform has started de facto if not officially with the deliberations on the positions of the future Member States in an enlarged Union. Italy is the first of the no-reform proponents to present its position to the Agriculture Council on 18 February, opening a battle with reform-minded supporters of more environment-friendly farming.