The EU Agriculture Ministers will debate, on Monday 17 January in Brussels at the first meeting under the French Presidency of the EU Council, agricultural trade issues, the situation of agricultural markets, carbon sequestration in agricultural soils and animal welfare.
Julien Denormandie will present the priorities of the French Presidency of the Council of the EU in the field of agriculture and fisheries: reciprocity of production standards, low-carbon agriculture, revision of the directive on the sustainable use of pesticides and the approval process of national strategic plans on the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), in particular.
Trade. EU Commissioner for Agriculture Janusz Wojciechowski is expected to recall that the EU wants to make progress in free trade agreement negotiations with Indonesia, New Zealand or Australia in 2022. An update will also be given on multilateral issues, including the WTO Ministerial Conference, recent decisions of the Dispute Settlement Body (Spanish olives) and the EU’s work in the FAO and G20 to promote European standards.
Agricultural markets. The Commission will review the situation of agricultural markets. A document summarises Member States’ contributions to this debate in the EU Council (https://bit.ly/31VKYFs ). Member States are expected to again draw attention to the negative effects of rising input costs (increased costs of feed, energy and fertiliser). Several countries will also reportedly request measures for the pigmeat sector.
The Commission will present its Communication on Sustainable Carbon Cycles on 15 December 2021. This is a priority issue for France, which has made it the theme of the informal meeting of EU agriculture ministers to take place on 7 and 8 February in Strasbourg.
Several delegations expressed their concerns, during the meeting of the Special Committee on Agriculture (SCA) on 10 January, regarding the coherence of the envisaged scheme (carbon sequestration in agriculture) with other EU policy tools (CAP), the problems linked to the definition of low-carbon agriculture or the administrative burden or the feasibility of the timetable.
Draft conclusions on this issue could be presented to the SCA experts on 31 January, with a view to adoption by the EU Council at the end of March.
Pigmeat. In view of the critical situation in the pig sector, the Czech Republic will ask the European Commission to take ‘exceptional and urgent’ EU support measures under Article 219 of the Common Market Organisation Regulation (https://bit.ly/3rl9l8n ).
Poland will raise the issue of the “potential negative effects” of the Belarusian embargo on EU food exports, including apples (https://bit.ly/3A6azbC ).
Animal health. Denmark wants to bring up the issue of EU legislation on the commercial keeping and sale of dogs (https://bit.ly/3GrTew3 ).
Finally, the Commission will provide information (https://bit.ly/3fECeqN ) on the High Level Stakeholder Conference on Animal Welfare in the EU (9 December 2021). (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)