The farming community has expressed that it is seriously concerned about the amount of money that will be allocated to the common agricultural policy (CAP) at the opening of the European Council in Brussels on Thursday, 20 February—at which time the European Council is expected to reach an agreement on the EU’s next Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) for 2021–2027 (see other news).
The latest proposal by European Council President Charles Michel allocates €329.3 billion to the CAP over the 2021–2027 period (at constant 2018 prices). This is 1.5% more than what the Commission had proposed (€324.3 billion) in May 2018 but well below (−13.9%) the envelope dedicated to the CAP in the 2014–2020 MFF (€382.9% billion). Charles Michel is proposing for more flexibility to be introduced for transfers between the first pillar (direct aid) and second pillar (rural development) of the CAP.
The European Council of Young Farmers (CEJA) has declared its support for the demonstration organised by Belgian farmers. Alongside the Belgian organisations Fédération des jeunes agriculteurs (Wallonia) and Groene Kring (Flanders), CEJA is calling for a “solid” budget to ensure that the ambitions of the new Commission and generation renewal in the agricultural sector are achieved.
CEJA is also concerned that second pillar funds, which are essential to ensure that young people join the agricultural sector and remain in it, will be drastically reduced (−25% compared to the current MFF, according to Mr Michel’s proposal).
EU agricultural cooperatives and organisations (Copa-Cogeca) are calling Charles Michel’s proposal “totally unacceptable”. “The proposal does not provide sufficient support to farmers to address the challenges they are facing and will continue to face in the future and will certainly not help them contribute to the objectives outlined in the European Green Deal”, asserts Copa-Cogeca.
France has indicated that the CAP is an “essential priority” in the budgetary debates, and several countries are on the same wavelength (Spain, Italy, Poland, etc.). “France will fight to have a CAP that matches our ambitions”, stated French President Emmanuel Macron on Thursday. On the contrary, the so-called ‘liberal’ countries are calling for the level of CAP appropriations to be further reduced.
A fairer CAP. Farmers from the Baltic countries, who demonstrated on Thursday morning, support their leaders’ demands for “full external convergence of agricultural direct payments [...] by the end of the next MFF”. Farmers from the Baltic countries complain that they systematically receive only 54% to 60% of the European average in direct payments, despite repeated calls to put an end to this unfair distribution of funds, “which does not reflect the realities of agriculture on the ground in Baltic countries”.
Mr Michel’s draft compromise only provides for continued external convergence of aid, which the Baltic states consider insufficient.
To read the Baltic leaders’ statement from the end of November 2019: http://bit.ly/3bR9Uhz (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)