Hundreds of farmers are planning a demonstration in front of the European Parliament on Tuesday, calling for fewer direct payments to large industrial farms under the proposed revision of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). EURACTIV Germany reports.<\/p>\n
An alliance of seven environmental and agricultural organisations have planned a protest at the start of the third plenary session of the newly-elected EU Parliament in Strasbourg on Tuesday (22 October).<\/p>\n
Hundreds of farmers and activists from Germany and France want to park their tractors in front of the Parliament building in Strasbourg and hand over their demands in person.<\/p>\n
They will be protesting the CAP\u2019s current draft. \u201cThe demonstration should be a signal to the Parliament, but also to the Commission, that the current draft of the new CAP urgently needs to be revised, says Saskia Richartz, the German spokesperson of the Good Food Good Farming alliance. \u201cThe new scientific findings of the latest IPCC reports must also be taken into account,\u201d she told EURACTIV.<\/p>\n
The demonstration marks the end of a month of Europe-wide protests against the CAP\u2019s current text.\u00a0Last year, numerous actions had already taken place in 19 member states and a petition with 114,000 signatures had been handed over to the agriculture ministers of the EU.<\/p>\n
Once again, the alliance is calling for the CAP\u2019s re-orientation to support a greater supply of local foods. \u201cFarmers continue to produce for the global market far too often, rather than for their own region. This is not sustainable,\u201d Richartz said.<\/p>\n
The alliance also demands that livestock farming be species-appropriate and in smaller herds and that more funds to protect arable lands and restrict pesticide use be unlocked.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut the biggest issue is that of direct payments, as these primarily support large farms instead of the small and medium-sized farms, which make up the bulk of the sector,\u201d said Richartz. According to the alliance, direct payments need to be gradually reduced, starting with the redistribution of 50% of the funds to both pillars under the CAP.<\/p>\n
Currently, the first pillar area-based payments account for around 70% to 80% of the total budget, averaging 40% of the income of European farmers.<\/p>\n
According to the demonstrators, the new draft of the CAP draft lacks binding guidelines for environmental protection. The planned \u201cimproved conditionality,\u201d which links the CAP\u2019s area-based direct payments to certain conditions, is \u201cso broadly diversified that it does not contribute to the necessary restructuring of the agricultural sector,\u201d according to Richartz.<\/p>\n
For instance, lump sums to renovate stables are granted without checking whether the implemented measures are climate-friendly or not.<\/p>\n
In Richartz\u2019s view, the newly-gained leeway that member states should have in the allocation of funds also represents a risk.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt makes sense to adapt measures to local conditions. But given that states can set their own priorities, we fear that climate projects will be watered down,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n
Post-2020 CAP may start two years late, socialist MEPs hint
\nIt is virtually impossible to have the reform of the Common Agriculture Policy (CAP), a key EU policy programme, ready for the start of the 2021-2027 programming period, according to two experienced socialist MEPs.<\/p>\n
Farmers\u2019 lobby critical of new conditions<\/p>\n
The CAP negotiations between the EU Parliament and the Council have not yet been concluded, and an agreement does not appear to be in immediate reach. Among other things, there is still disagreement regarding the planned payments linked to the preservation of ecosystems.<\/p>\n
Some EU member states intend to introduce them as a voluntary measure. Italy, for instance, would like to obtain an exemption for small businesses. Moreover, negotiations on what requirements farmers should meet to receive direct payments are still underway.<\/p>\n
The European agricultural lobby Copa-Cogeca rejects increasing requirements for direct payments. If the CAP budget were cut at the same time, this would be \u201cunacceptable\u201d, the organisation wrote in an official statement in response to the Commission\u2019s proposal on the CAP.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis will lead to considerable income losses for farmers and significantly limit the possibilities of ecological measures in the second pillar,\u201d the association feared.<\/p>\n
In any case, negotiations in Parliament and Council are likely to drag on for some time. Members of the Agriculture Committee recently indicated to EURACTIV that the new CAP could be delayed by up to two years.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Hundreds of farmers are planning a demonstration in front of the European Parliament on Tuesday, calling for fewer direct payments to large industrial farms under the proposed revision of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). EURACTIV Germany reports. An alliance of seven environmental and agricultural organisations have planned a protest at the start of the third […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":59,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","nova_meta_subtitle":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5572],"tags":[6630,5838,6406],"supplier":[2619,6091,4514,8948,1806,608,781],"class_list":["post-68063","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bio-based","tag-agriculture","tag-bioeconomy","tag-environment","supplier-copa-cogeca","supplier-european-council","supplier-european-parliament","supplier-mitsubishi-hitachi-power-systems-europe","supplier-ruhr-universitaet-bochum","supplier-siemens-ag","supplier-universitaet-stuttgart"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68063","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/59"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=68063"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68063\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68063"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=68063"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=68063"},{"taxonomy":"supplier","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/supplier?post=68063"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}