Press release: Paris, November 26th

A group of French organisations with shared interests in defending the environment, sustainable agriculture and development, international solidarity and rural movements, have reacted to a communication issued by the European Commission about the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) after 2013, published on November 18.

Our organisations have welcomed with interest the European Commission’s Communication entitled: The CAP towards 2020: Meeting the food, natural resources and territorial challenges of the future.

We welcome the Commission’s willingness to encourage sustainable practices and production systems to ensure the supply of environmental services, as well as the integration of the environment and the fight against climate change as guiding principles in the future development of rural development policy. However, it is still too early to ascertain whether this “greening” is real or fake. [more]

Within the CAP health check framework, the dairy sector became the fifth element of the “new challenges” list, behind four other priorities for the future of European agriculture: climate change, renewable energy, water management and biodiversity. Why dairy sector ? In return for his acceptance of a gradual increase of milk quotas, Germany, as the largest producer of the EU, has struggled to get a dairy fund in the agreement of Nov. 20th 2008, to fund measures accompanying the restructuring of the dairy sector “through the pillar of rural development. Specifically, the dairy fund will provide investment support to improve the competitiveness of farms and cooperatives face the scheduled phasing out of quotas in 2015. Funding for these actions will be undertaken with the money generated from progressive modulation at 4% rate, targeting farms receiving more than 300 000 €, in addition to the compulsory modulation that will increase from 7% in 2009 to 10% in 2010 . What does this mean in terms of additional funding for rural development ? According to the European Commission, this will provide a total of 3, 241 Billions euros between 2010 and 2013. These measures will be funded at 75% by Brussels (90% in the most disadvantaged regions).

In reality, each Member state is free to prioritize these new challenges, i.e.  to concentrate all resources on the dairy sector and by making the impasse on others. According to German environmental organizations, the Bundesländer, who are the authorities on rural development programs in Germany, intend to devote the bulk of the money to build new stables in the dairy sector, involving more intensive production, accepting milk prices lower, with fewer producers, and with less grassland in perspective. On the other side of the Rhine in France, Michel Barnier recently announced a budget of 45 Millions euros for milk mountain, roughly 20 euros per tonne of milk.

Member States and regions are invited to submit Rural Development plans for their actions under the new challenges before June 30th 2009 for implementation on January 1st 2010. Until then, Member states must find an agreement to abolish a rule of EAFRD (Funding 2nd pillar) which restricts investment support to dairy farmers based on their available quota. In other words, the second pillar of the CAP will fund an increase in milk production in exchange for lower prices paid to producers.

Dairy producers (some of them anyway) can thanks the taxpayers. After the come back of export refunds and subsidies for private storage in last December for butter and powdered milk unmarketable, the toolbox of Rural Development will provide the means of restructuring the dairy, targeting subsidies towards competitive holdings. In the jargon of Commission officials, this is called a soft landing… It is unfortunate that other ways to produce milk, economically efficient and ecologically friendly, with less inputs and with few subsidies, are not taken into consideration within the CAP. Even more unfortunate, finally, a dairy policy based on supply management would cost much less for the EU budget.

Position paper - February 2008

The French organisations signing this document wish to examine and comment on the Commission’s “health check” in greater depth, and to put forward approaches for improvements that would anticipate on foreseeable trends. The challenges that a European policy will be facing reach far beyond consultations with agricultural and food industry interests alone, for they encompass the whole gamut of social demands and issues concerning food, the environment, climate change and rural development.

Dowload the document

Accord difficile sur la PAC, mais compromis tout de même à l’issue d’un marathon des ministres de l’Agriculture de l’Union européenne à Bruxelles qui s’est terminé le 20 novembre au matin. Les pays européens se sont donc mis d’accord pour réaménager la Politique agricole commune via un relèvement progressif des quotas laitiers et un transfert des subventions à la production vers le développement rural.

A lire : le document du compromis final sur le bilan de santé : final-compromise-clean