On Wednesday 9 November in Brussels, MEPs regretted the lack of ambition in the communication on fertilisers and called for the lifting of anti-dumping duties on fertilisers produced by third countries.
“There are excessive profits, speculative bubbles and oligopolies on the side of the fertiliser companies. We need to tackle this problem and see how we can bring down costs in Europe”, said Italian MEP Herbert Dorfmann (EPP, Italian). If you add up the extra costs that farmers have to bear because of rising energy and fertiliser costs, it comes to €45 billion for this year, he added.
Clara Aguilera (S&D, Spanish) asked the European Commission: “Will we be able to use organic fertilisers and will there be an amendment to the directive to allow this? Because it has not been possible so far”.
For Ulrike Müller (Renew Europe, German), “the CAP is a Christmas tree with so many baubles that the branches are starting to break”, referring to the fact that this policy has to finance everything. She believes that nitrogen and phosphorus should be considered in a differentiated way. For nitrogen, it is energy dependence; for phosphorus, it is strategic dependence on third countries.
Thomas Waitz (Greens/EFA, German) also criticised the “huge” profits made by fertiliser companies in the EU. “So why should we now use taxpayers’ money to support these companies?” It is healthy soil, according to him, that will provide us with food security in the years to come; and he said he did not understand why, in these times of climate crisis, “we continue to support artificial fertilisers”.
Anti-dumping duties. Gilles Lebreton (ID, French) deplored the fact that the Commission had refused to lift the surcharges imposed in 2019 on fertilisers from Trinidad and Tobago and the United States, “ even though this lifting had been requested by Copa-Cogeca, which represents a very large number of European farmers”.
Norbert Lins (EPP, Germany), chairman of the European Parliament Agriculture Committee, sees “more shadow than light in this communication. In the short term, I see little effort to improve the fertiliser situation in Europe”. He would also have wanted the suspension of anti-dumping duties for Trinidad and Tobago and the US.
Anne Sander (EPP, French) deplored the fact that the communication mainly contains measures that have already been taken or measures that refer solutions to the Member States. She also called for the lifting of anti-dumping duties on fertilisers produced by third countries.
“It would be important to temporarily suspend the punitive tax on imports or anti-dumping duties to send a signal to our European farmers”, added Peter Jahr (EPP, German).
Carmen Avram (S&D, Romanian) called for the urgent suspension of tariffs on urea and ammonia, for securing the amount of gas needed for fertiliser production and for identifying new mineral deposits in the EU needed for fertiliser production.
RENURE fertiliser. Bert-Jan Ruissen (ECR, Dutch) regretted that the Commission did not exploit the solution offered by RENURE fertilisers, nutrients from animal manure “which we can recycle ourselves into high-quality renewable fertilisers”. Mr Lins mentioned the use of RENURE, Struvit, Stripping or regional flexibilities under the Nitrates Directive.
Commissioner for Agriculture Janusz Wojciechowski promised that “these derogations” will be addressed in 2023 in an action plan for integrated nutrient management (see EUROPE 13060/5). He justified the continuation of anti-dumping duties: “Protecting producers from dumping is necessary to protect fertiliser production in Europe”, he said. The Commissioner also highlighted the lack of budgetary margin in the CAP budget. (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)