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Last week, Austria expressed concerns about a possible fall in organic production prices following the planned strengthening of organic farming in the EU. As part of the new Farm to Fork and Biodiversity strategies, the European Commission is proposing to expand the area of organic farming to 25% of total agricultural land, and the Action Plan for Organic Farming presented by the Commission this year should also help meet this goal. Austrian Minister of Agriculture Elisabeth Köstinger stated that Austria is already meeting the European target - currently, 26% of the land in Austria is organically farmed. However, due to the supported strengthening of the area of organic farming in other EU member states, the current prices could fall, which also plays a compensatory role for Austrian farmers for lower production.

On 06/07/2021, the European Commission published a short-term outlook for the market situation. The Commission expects cereal production to grow in 2021/22, with EU cereal production expected to reach 288.7 million tonnes (+ 3%), thanks to increased production of in soft and durum wheat and maize. EU oil and protein crop production could increase to 30.1 million tonnes (+ 9.5%) and 4.6 million tonnes (+ 6.7%). Sugar beet production in the EU is also expected to increase to around 110 million tonnes. An increase in production is also expected for olive oil, wine, tomatoes, peaches and nectarines or pork. On the contrary, the Commission expects a decline in beef and in poultry, mainly due to the occurrence of bird flu. Goat and mutton production should remain stable.
More information is available here.

At the Council of Ministers on 28/06/2021, the Ministers of Agriculture confirmed the agreement reached by the European institutions on 25/06/2021 on the future shape of the Common Agricultural Policy. The agreement was supported by 26 Member States, with only Bulgaria abstaining due to the exclusion of support for ware potatoes from coupled support (VCS). Portugal has therefore succeeded in reaching a major political agreement in the trilogue during its presidency and in securing support for this agreement from the Member States. The CAP reform package includes, inter alia, measures aimed at reallocating funds to small and medium-sized agricultural holdings. Based on the agreement reached, Member States will have to redirect 10% of direct payments to such agricultural holdings (in principle through redistributive payments, unless they can demonstrate that they can achieve the same result through other comparable instruments). During the discussion in the Council, the agreement on the degressivity of direct payments was slightly modified. Under the original agreement of 25/06/2021, Member States were allowed to voluntarily - in addition to capping - introduce a degressivity of direct payments of 85% (neither more nor less) for amounts between € 60,000 and € 100,000. Ministers have newly supported the change in wording, degressivity has now been ‘freed’ from the dependence on capping, and can be introduced separately for amounts from € 60,000, without an upper ceiling (so it should be technically possible to introduce degressivity for amounts above € 300,000, for example, without the introduction of capping over € 100,000), up to 85% (it is now possible to reduce payments by less than 85%, so it should be technically possible to introduce degressivity for amounts above, for example, € 300,000 by only 5%). The rules of the new CAP will apply from the end of the transitional period to the end of the programming period, i.e., from the beginning of 2023 to the end of 2027.
More information is available here, non-consolidated version of the agreement here.

Slovenia took over the Presidency of the Council of the European Union after Portugal on 01/07/2021, the Slovenian Presidency will end at the end of 2021, then France (in the first half of 2022) and the Czech Republic (in the second half of 2022) will take over. One of Slovenia's main agricultural priorities will be the completion of technical negotiations on CAP reform (the agreement reached in the trilogue, and the Council is a political agreement so far, all legislative wording of the proposals is missing). Slovenia also plans to assist Member States as much as possible in drawing up national strategic plans, which must be submitted to the European Commission by 31/12/2021. Other priorities include Farm to Fork, the European Green Deal, transposition of the EU Directive on unfair commercial practices into national legislation (Slovenia will also focus on honey labelling), combating African swine fever, strengthening support for small farmers and family farms, modernizing rural areas, support for young farmers, or strengthening the position of farmers in the supply chain.

On 05/07/2021, the European Commission officially unveiled a new Code of Conduct for Responsible Business and Marketing Practice, which is part of the Farm to Fork strategy, which brings together voluntary commitments from the agri-food sector to support the shift to sustainable food systems. According to the Commission, the signing of the Code commits the food industry to speeding up its contribution to sustainable transformation. The Code includes two levels of commitment, for European organizations (a total of 7 objectives with roadmaps and indicative actions related to measures to support the transition to healthy and sustainable consumption patterns in order to improve the sustainability impact of the food processing, food retail and catering sectors and to improve the sustainability of food value chains in relation to primary producers and other actors in the chain), and for larger food businesses that want to become leaders in sustainability (ambitious commitments with measurable results for a wide range of areas - from animal welfare to reducing sugar in food to reducing greenhouse gas emissions - across a range of their products). As of the day the Code was introduced, 65 companies, including food giants Nestlé, Mondeléz, PepsiCo, Coca - Cola, Danone, Ferrero, and Kellogg´s, have committed to support the Code; trading companies including Tesco, Carrefour, or Ahold Delhaize; or representatives of European farmers and food producers, including Copa and Cogeca and FoodDrinkEurope.
More information is available here.