Brussels, 10/03/2016 (Agence Europe) - In Strasbourg on Thursday 10 March, a great many MEPs raised the alarm over the worrying situation experienced by pig producers.
Most of the MEPs called upon the European Commission to take measures to freeze the market or reduce production. Some of them criticised the absence of Agriculture Commissioner Phil Hogan from this debate, which was held on the basis of an oral question by Czes³aw Adam Siekierski (EPP, Poland), on behalf of the committee on agriculture and rural development of the EP.
Siekierski stressed that the ban which continues to apply in Russia to imports of food products from the EU has deprived European pig farmers of their greatest outlet. This has led to serious difficulties in the pork meat sector, where prices are experiencing considerable downwards pressure, far above usual cyclical variations. He said that the private storage aid regime, currently frozen, “was not enough to stabilise prices and rebalance the market”. He urged the Commission to assess the consequences on the market of products returning to the market following destorage.
Commissioner Hahn said that the sector was in a “very tense” situation due to an increase of production over the last two years and the Russian ban. In January 2016, 90,000 tonnes of pork meat were stored (cost: €27.6 million). “Our safety net worked, as farmers' revenues were stabilised”, he said. This statement provoked anger among certain MEPs. “We are following the situation and we will take measures if necessary”, Hahn pledged.
“Agriculture is experiencing tough times”, said Daniel Buda (EPP, Romania). It costs €1.25 to produce a kilo of pork meat and this is sold for €0.78, “this is an untenable situation”, he said. Private storage is not, in his view, enough to stabilise prices. In France and Romania, there is not enough room to store pork meat, he explained. Buda went on to call for new aid mechanisms for the sector. He called upon the Commission to revise its position on Romanian pork (which is banned for sale in the other countries of the EU), “as there is no longer any classic swine fever”. Eric Andrieu (S&D, France) repeated the many cases of suicides among farmers in France, pointing out that 30% of pork farmers are in a crisis situation (and that 10% of them have gone bankrupt). He called for rules: - exceptional measures to reduce production, such as slaughtering sows and reducing carcass weights (3 kg less per carcass would solve the overproduction problem, he argued); - reopening private storage age, adopting the list of storable products which may be sold for export; - origin labelling on processed products. “The Russian market needs to be reopened”, said Jan Huitema (ALDE, Netherlands), who is opposed to market management measures. He called for new measures (such as Japan) to be sought. Miguel Viegas (GUE/NGL, Portugal) hit out at a “deregulated” CAP. Portugal imports 40% of its pork meat and prices are unsustainable, he stressed. Prices have fallen by 15% compared to 2015, said Bronis Rope (Greens/EFA, Lithuania), who criticised unfair competition on the part of countries which do not observe the same rules as the EU in terms of animal welfare. (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)