The majority of political group coordinators on the European Parliament Agriculture Committee agreed on Tuesday 14 July on a procedure that should lead to a plenary vote on the post-2020 Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) at the end of October (19-22 October session).
However, some consider this timetable to be too ambitious, especially as the European Parliament's Agriculture and Environment Committees have not yet agreed on the respective competences for the proposal on 'strategic plans' for the CAP.
The Chair of the Agriculture Committee, Norbert Lins (EPP, Germany), said : “The Agriculture Committee as a lead committee on the EU farm policy reform will continue to work hard to ensure that the Parliament can approve a strong mandate for its negotiators already in the second half of October. This would allow us to start interinstitutional negotiations under the German EU Council Presidency”.
The coordinators asked the political groups to provide their position on the green architecture of the future CAP (cross-compliance, agri-environmental measures, eco-schemes, etc.) at the end of the summer.
The rapporteur for the CAP strategic plans, Peter Jahr (EPP, Germany), will then be responsible for “negotiating plenary-level compromise amendments under the leadership of the Agriculture Committee”, according to Norbert Lins.
The rapporteurs for the horizontal regulation, Ulrike Müller (Renew Europe, Germany), and the Common Market Organisation (CMO), Eric Andrieu (S&D, France), will have to formulate compromise amendments for the plenary in September.
Unlike the 'strategic plans', these two texts are the sole responsibility of the Agriculture Committee. Work would be well advanced on the CMO.
The German Presidency of the EU Council hopes to achieve a common position on CAP reform as early as October (see other news) (Lionel Changeur)