Brussels, 15/10/2010 (Agence Europe) - France and Italy are calling for a strong common agricultural policy (CAP) with new market regulation, and say that the CAP “must not be a budget balancing item” in future debates on the review of the European Union financial framework. That was the clear message that came out of the meeting between Italian Agriculture, Food and Forestry Policy Minister Giancarlo Galan and Bruno Le Maire, French Food, Agriculture and Fisheries Minister, in Rome on Thursday 14 October.
Following on from the steps taken under the Italian Presidency of the G8 in 2008, France and Italy decided to work together to prepare the forthcoming French Presidency of the G20, which will, from November 2010, have tackling excessive agricultural price volatility included on its agenda. A Franco-Italian working group has been set up for that purpose.
“The CAP must bring new market regulation to shield farmers from price volatility. This requires effective, more responsive market instruments, better structuring of sectors, including strengthening producers' organisation and the role of joint-trade organisations, and added value given to agricultural and food products,” states a press release from the French Ministry of Agriculture, resuming the points of agreement between Italy and France after the ministers' meeting. The two countries consider it essential that CAP funding should match ambitions, and that sharing the budget among member states must be fair and also budgetarily sustainable. “It has to take account of the wide differences in economic conditions in Europe and the net budget contribution of each of the EU's member states,” they say.
“Like Germany and Italy, our view is that the CAP budget must at least be kept at current levels and we believe that most EU countries are now with us on that,” Le Maire said in a joint press conference with Galan in Rome. France, Le Maire said, “is demonstrating great openness of spirit” in agreeing to the review of direct payments to French farmers. “It's not an easy thing to tell them that they might be getting €100 from the EU at the moment, but soon it could be 90, 80 or 70 so as to help Polish or Czech farmers,” he said.
Galan pointed out that the Franco-German initiative on the CAP post-2013 (see EUROPE 10215 and 10219, inter alia) had the backing of countries like Italy and Spain but that “lots of countries from the north and east of Europe were not of the same view”. Le Maire said he was counting on the support of Italy on the labelling of food products. “I said to Giancarlo (Galan) that it wasn't right that a ham should be sold in France with a little Italian flag on it, when it had been produced in Central or Eastern Europe,” Le Maire said. The other problem, he pointed out, was “the import into the EU of products which do not meet the same health and environmental standards”.
While in Rome, the French agriculture minister also met Jacques Diouf, Director General of the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation, as this body will, “of course, be closely involved in G20 discussions” on the issue of price volatility. Le Maire told the FAO that there was a need for greater transparency on global stocks with statistical measuring instruments common to all G20 countries and “better organisation of markets on which agricultural products are traded”. (L.C./transl.rt)