On Monday 15 November, the European Commission once again dashed the hopes of the many EU Council delegations that have been calling for EU market measures for the pigmeat sector.
At Monday’s Agriculture Council, the Lithuanian delegation, supported by the Austrian, Belgian, Bulgarian, Croatian, Cypriot, Czech, Estonian, French, Greek, Hungarian, Latvian, Polish and Slovak delegations, asked the Commission to introduce “exceptional EU support measures” for the pigmeat sector under the Common Market Organisation (CMO) Regulation as a matter of urgency.
The Commission replied that the current market situation was largely the result of an imbalance between supply and demand. “While we fully share the concerns about this situation, we must ask whether we should actually intervene in the market at EU level”, said a Commission source. The institution pointed out that EU countries could employ “targeted national measures” in the pigmeat sector (rural development programme and state aid support).
“The sector is going through a very difficult period, but we must be careful not to give the impression that market support measures at EU level are the solution to the sector’s current problems”, argued a Commission source.
In addition, several agriculture ministers (France, Germany, Spain, etc.) have asked the Commission to take action to mitigate the effects of rising input prices, including for fertilisers.
Link to the 14-country paper on pigmeat: https://bit.ly/3nijtxW (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)