News

At the end of June 2021, the European institutions agreed on the political text of the agreement on the reformed Common Agricultural Policy; at the end of July, the last trilogue took place, during which the agreement was translated from the political text to the legislative text. The final text has not yet been published, the Slovenian Presidency is finalizing the text, which should then be translated into all official EU languages and formally approved by the European Parliament and the Council. For some technical elements, delegated and implementing acts will still be presented by the Commission. Member States must submit draft strategic plans by 01/01/2022, after which the Commission will have six months to assess and approve the strategic plans. In assessing the national strategic plans, the Commission will also assess whether the national plans contribute to the objectives of the European Green Deal. If the proposed measures do not meet the objectives, the European Commission will have the right to ask the Member States to review the proposals. Also in December 2020, the Commission presented a set of recommendations for the creation of national strategic plans for each of the Member States; according to the Commission's statement at the time, these recommendations are to be voluntary. According to the latest statement, the Commission will use these recommendations when assessing draft national strategic plans, the recommendations will serve as reference points for the Commission.
More information is available here.

Janusz Wojciechowski, Commissioner for Agriculture and Rural Development, said last week at the Pre-Summit of the UN Food Systems Summit that the European Union is committed to becoming a world leader in moving towards sustainable food production. The transition to sustainability in the EU should be facilitated by the European Green Deal, the Farm to Fork Strategy and the EU Biodiversity Strategy, through radical changes throughout the supply chain. These changes should make the EU a climate-neutral bloc. European agriculture should continue to benefit society, a source of livelihood for farmers, while protecting the environment more. Wojciechowski emphasized that full sustainability in the EU can not only be achieved by strengthening sustainability in the European Union, but also by strengthening sustainability in trade agreements with third countries. The Pre-Summit will be followed by the UN Food Systems Summit, which will take place in New York on 22-24/09/2021. In addition to Wojciechowski, the Summit is expected to be attended by Frans Timmermans, Executive Vice-President of the European Commission, and Stella Kyriakides, Commissioner for Health and Food Safety.

France has developed a new food labelling system that builds on the French Nutri-Score and Eco-Score systems. The new labelling system is Planet-Score, a system that combines a traffic light system with information on pesticides used, climate and biodiversity impacts, as well as information on animal welfare. The system should be usable both for the assessment of food across individual categories (i.e., meat versus fruit), but also within one category (for example for apples). The colour scale should identify not only the use of pesticides used to produce the food, but also their content in the food as such; climate impacts of food production (assessment criteria will include the amount of greenhouse gas emissions associated with food production or carbon capture); and the impacts of production on biodiversity (here the criteria include the size of agricultural plots or the existence of draws in the fields). The last monitored factor of agricultural production, which should be included in the labelling, is animal welfare. According to the authors of the label, different methods of animal husbandry have different impacts on the environment and climate.
More information is available here.

For the first time, the European Commission has included animal welfare-based condition in the EU-Mercosur trade agreement. Under the market access provisions negotiated in the EU's Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with Mercosur of 15/07/2021, EU animal welfare standards must now be applied to preferential imports of eggs from Mercosur. However, the Commission does not plan to add any additional animal welfare-based conditions. The largest European agricultural organization, Copa and Cogeca, considers the amendment to be a very important step, but insufficient for ratification of the agreement. Copa and Cogeca still consider the agreement to be unbalanced and inconsistent with the objectives of the European Green Deal.
More information is available here.

The Assessment Group on Glyphosate (AGG), composed of experts from FR, HU, NL, and SE, issued a report of almost 11,000 pages, according to which glyphosate cannot be classified as a carcinogen. After examining all the evidence submitted by companies seeking renewal of EU glyphosate approval, the AGG report states that glyphosate can cause serious eye damage but is not carcinogenic and therefore fulfils the criteria for further approval of the substance. On 15/06/2021, the AGG submitted its assessments to the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) and the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) in a draft recovery assessment report (dRAR) and reports containing a proposal for a harmonized classification and labelling (CLH). EFSA and ECHA will now continue the classification process, and a public consultation should be launched in the first week of September.
More information is available here.