Copa and Cogeca leaders met in Brussels over the past two days at a critical time for European agriculture. Following exchanges with the European Commission, DG AGRI Director-General Pierre Bascou, and the President of the American Farm Bureau, Zippy Duvall, European farming organisations took key decisions on major issues, from the mounting pressures hitting the sector to the future of the Common Agricultural Policy.
The situation unfolding in agriculture is unprecedented. Feedback from the field is alarming. Across Europe, farmers and cooperatives are being forced into impossible choices as costs for fuel, fertilisers, packaging, feed, and logistics continue to surge. Many are now reducing acreage, changing crops, or abandoning sowing altogether, simply because production itself is becoming economically unviable. This is a situation now affecting all production sectors in a tense market context.
Disruption to current production capacity will have long-term consequences and will ultimately affect European consumers if no swift and decisive action is taken at EU level.
The shared feeling among all farming leaders is that the Commission is extremely slow to grasp what is happening and, so far, has not put forward any concrete measures. The Commission talks, but action is still lagging.
With two major conflicts affecting Europe’s neighbourhood, the EU urgently needs a strong, coordinated response on the scale of that deployed during COVID-19 and in the aftermath of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. This response must safeguard food production, ensure energy security, and preserve the integrity of the Single Market.
In this regard, the draft Temporary Crisis Energy Framework and the “AccelerateEU” plan released this week need to be urgently translated into concrete measures to support sectors most in difficulty and boost energy supply, with the key role of agriculture.
On another crucial issue, Copa and Cogeca members have adopted three key position papers on the future EU budget and CAP:
- The MFF, Performance Framework, NRPP and CAP
- The Common Market Organisation
- The European Competitiveness Fund
In the current geopolitical context, weakening the Common Agricultural Policy would not only weaken agriculture but also undermine Europe’s strategic autonomy. This would be a serious and historic mistake at a time when peace, stability, and food affordability/security can no longer be taken for granted.
The European farming community is united behind a single message to co-legislators: the CAP must remain a truly common policy, with a dedicated, ring-fenced and protected budget. It must be maintained at least at current levels and indexed for inflation over the 2021–2027 period.
In the coming weeks, Copa and Cogeca will strongly mobilise on these two key issues. European policymakers cannot remain passive when the EU has the tools to act and provide much-needed relief to its food production sector.
Fonte: Copa and Cogeca
