Announcements made following the meeting between EU Member States’ agriculture ministers and the European Commission “fall short of addressing the urgency and challenges faced by Europe’s farmers and agri-cooperatives”, while the manoeuvring around the EU-Mercosur trade agreement is only exacerbating “frustrations”, according to a Copa-Cogeca press release published on Tuesday 13 January (see EUROPE 13783/1).
Meeting the day before to analyse the situation, Copa-Cogeca’s leaders decided that, in the current political context, marked by tense market conditions and unanswered demands, they would support the demonstration planned in Strasbourg on 20 January by the Fédération nationale des syndicats d'exploitants agricoles (FNSEA), the main French farming union (see EUROPE 13781/4). On Tuesday, more than 350 tractors were parked outside the National Assembly in Paris.
“At a time when market conditions for cereal and livestock production are extremely volatile, and farmers are caught in a price squeeze between rising fertiliser and input costs and declining incomes, it is more necessary than ever to have decisive political decisions capable of restoring long-term visibility and stability”, according to Copa-Cogeca.
On 18 December last year, EU farmers formulated three demands: a strong and properly funded post-2027 CAP, fair and transparent trade and genuine simplification. Copa-Cogeca now expects European Parliament to address these three fundamental demands “because it has the means to act on these pressing issues”. (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)