Brussels, 06/02/2001 (Agence Europe) - The European Farmers' Coordination (EFC) considers that, given the magnitude of the crisis for stock farmers and the beef sector, it is no longer bearable for the cattle feed industry and the squaring and cutting industry, which must be held accountable for the development of BSE (ED.: bovine spongiform encephalopathy), to go unpunished or even to commercially benefit from the crisis". It expresses indignation about the proposals made by Commissioner Franz Fischler (reduction in support to stock farmers, temporary suppression of the suckler cow premium), which would mean the budgetary problem is supported by "stock farmers, the innocent victims of the BSE scandal". In order to face up to the financial problem, the EFC mainly proposes to: - create a European fund for compensating damage caused by BSE, financed by the animal feed industry, the squaring industry, the EU and the Member States; - set in place a ceiling for aid paid in the context of Common Agricultural Policy (CAP); - replace the maize premium by a premium for all fodder in order not to penalise grazing livestock; - promote the production of crops rich in protein, with support and possibilities for growing crops on fallow land; - reform the CAP in depth.
The farmers' confederation calls on the European Commission to begin, without delay, the preparation of reform that puts an end to industrial stockfarming, to productivism, and to the disappearance of small farms, and which brings into question the current EU position at the WTO. The EFC, which proposes a "CAP without doping or dumping", will be organising on 12 and 13 March in Brussels, a European conference for preparing this future CAP. It invites the agriculture ministers of Germany, France and Italy to take part.