News

The Council was held in Brussels on 28/01/2019, for the first time under the Romanian Presidency (RO PRES). Romanian Agriculture Minister Petre Daea confirmed that priorities of RO PRES will include negotiations on the reform of the CAP, the final adoption of the directive on unfair trade practices, and the monitoring of animal health in border areas. According to Daea, RO plan is to present a compromise EU Council text on the CAP post 2020 by the Council of Ministers on 18/03/2019, a general agreement on some parts of the proposal should be reached by the end of June 2019.

Ministers also discussed the new CAP implementation mechanism and the Strategic Plan, taking into account the proposed deadlines. The deadline for submitting a report on the process of the establishment of National Strategic Plan was set by the EC on 15/02/2019, according to the majority of agriculture ministers (AT, SI, ES, FI, PT, BE, HR, PL, DE, SE, GR, EE, BG, MT, LT, LV, LU, IT, SK, CY) but it is not certain that all Member States will be able to meet this deadline.

The new green architecture of the CAP, which, according to some ministers, complicates rather than simplifies the whole policy, was also discussed. A number of ministers have objected to climate and environmental regimes (so-called eco-schemes) being binding, on the contrary, France has supported in its position to the CAP the introduction of eco-schemes in the EU Member States.

Ministers further discussed the CAP emergency reserve; the so-called 'protein plan', a plan to strengthen the production of protein crops in the EU and how to reduce the EU's dependence on their imports from South American countries; African swine fever (Commissioner for Health and Food Safety Vytenis Andriukaitis informed about the outcome of the conference held on 19/12/2018); antimicrobial resistance (Danish delegation informed about the establishment of Copenhagen International Antimicrobial Resistance Centre); and dual quality products.

The Ministers of Agriculture supported:
Ensuring stronger Second Pillar of the CAP; refusing the reduction of budget for the Second Pillar: SI, HR, PT, ES, CZ, DE, CY, SI, SK, GR, LU, HU, PL, LT, IE, BG, SE, FI, MT, FR. On the contrary, Dutch Minister Carola Schouten said that given the new EU priorities, it is not possible to maintain the CAP budget at the current level beyond 2020;
Greater flexibility in terms of tolerance range in the first two years of implementation of Strategic Plans, with tolerances of 25% to 35%: ES, AT, FI, PT, FR, HR, DE, SE, LV, BG, IT, EE, LU , CY. Deviations of up to 50% were supported by CZ and HU;
Introducing the transition period due to the low probability of the new CAP being implemented in 2021: CZ, IT;
Funding of the Emergency Reserve: In support of the Commission proposal to remove the threshold of 2000 €, FI, SE, FR, CZ, DE, IE, NL, DK, LU and SK expressed the support of maintaining the limit of 2000 €. , MT, LT, HU, IT and GR;
Maintain the status quo in the wine sector: BG, HR, CY, GR, HU, IT, MT, PT, SK, SI, ES.

More information on the program of the Council of Ministers is available here, refusal to reduce budget of the Second Pillar of the CAP is available here, the Protein Plan is available here and here, the wine sector here, the African swine fever here, the antimicrobial resistance here, and the dual quality of the products here.

The European Parliament's Committee for Agriculture and Rural Development (COMAGRI) presented the CAP draft reports after 2020 on 21/11/2018; to table amendments to the draft reports was possible till 03/12/2018. COMAGRI is now working on all amendments and drafting of compromise proposals, which should be the basis for the vote on the COMAGRI position (preliminary date 18-19/03/2019) and subsequently on the EP's position in the Plenary sitting (preliminary second half of April 2019).

The EP’s Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development met on 29/01/2019 to discuss compromise proposals for the first time. One of the issues addressed by MEPs during the talks was the lack of time to discuss and adopt the EP's position before the EP elections, which will take place on 2326/05/2019. MEPs also stressed the need for simplification of the CAP, and the Commission's legislative proposals, according to them, represent simplification only at the EU level but not at farm level; in line with the EP's position, the reduction of the CAP budget, in particular under the Second Pillar of the CAP was also rejected.

Spanish MEP Clara Aguilar García (S&D) said that it is absolutely crucial for her political faction to introduce compulsory capping for all Member States. However, Romanian MEP Maria Gabriela Zoana (S&D) has opposed that, although she is an S&D member herself, it is absolutely unacceptable for her as a representative of Romania. Zoana also supported Daniel Buda (RO, EPP). Green MEPs criticized EP's compromise proposal to cut direct payments, presented by Esther Herranz García (ES, EPP) rapporteur for the CAP Strategic Plans. García has proposed a mandatory reduction of at least 25% of direct payments above € 150,000, while payments for young farmers and eco-schemes should not be reduced. At the same time, if Member States earmarked at least 5% of the envelope for direct payments for redistribution payments, Member States could decide not to apply the Article on the reduction of payments at all. However, according to the Greens, this proposal is not an oversubscription, therefore repeatedly called on the rapporteur and other MEPs to introduce compulsory payment of direct payments, with payments over € 5060.000 being reduced by 100%. Herbert Dorfmann (IT, EPP) and Franc Bogovič (SI, EPP) also backed the mandatory capping, but French MEP Michel Dantin and German MEP Peter Jahr (both EPP) warned against the negative effects of rigid oversupply.

Irish MEP Luke Ming Flanagan (GUE, NGL) supported the achievement of 100% internal convergence of direct payments by 2027. The Romanian MEP Daniel Buda (EPP) and Lithuanian MEP Bronis Ropé (Greens) supported the 100% external convergence of direct payments. The maintenance of coupled support was supported by Hungarian MEP Norbert Erdos (EPP) and French MEP Michel Dantin (EPP). Support for the rapporteur's proposal to increase compulsory support for young farmers from 2 to 3% was supported, among others, by Norbert Erdos (HU, EPP) and Maria Gabriela Zoana (RO, S&D).

In its position paper on the Common Agricultural Policy, France supported the European Commission's proposal for external convergence of direct payments. The European Commission proposes that all Member States with direct payments below 90% of the EU average should continue in the process launched in the 2014-2020 period and close 50% of the existing gap to 90%. To finance this external convergence of the level of direct payments, all Member States should contribute, according to the Commission. For many EU Member States, achieving external convergence is one of the key priorities (PT, LT, LV, GR, PL, RO, SK and others). Conversely, BE, NL or IT spoke against complete external convergence.
More information is available here.

On 31/01/2019, Finland refused an increase in the European Union’s budget to the 1,114% of GNI proposed by the Commission. Finnish Prime Minister Juha Sipilä said the total budget under the Multiannual Financial Framework after 2020 should be as close as possible to the current EU budget. The EU Member States should agree on the budget by autumn 2019. The Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden and Austria also hold a similar position as Finland. According to FI, the new budget should find a compromise between funding traditional EU policies and funding new challenges, attention should be paid to migration, security, the single market, innovation, digitization and the climate. In the context of agricultural policy, support should be directed in particular to the Second Pillar of the CAP. Finland takes over the presidency of the Council of the EU since 01/07/2019; Juha Sipilä therefore believes that the FI may, during its Presidency, conclude a debate on the EU budget. The estimated budget should be between 1% and 1,114% of GNI, according to the opposite attitudes of other EU Member States.

On 30/01/2019, the Institute for European Environmental Policy (IEEP) published a report which looked at the benefits of the proposed climate and environmental schemes (so-called Eco-Schemes). According to the Commission's proposal, the Eco-Schemes would be required by Member States to propose, but farmers would not be required to use them, they should be financially motivated to do so. According to IEEP, the introduction of this system is rather risky, but it offers an effective way for national governments to motivate farmers to use environmentally-friendly farming practices. According to IEEP, eco-schemes should be properly targeted and supported by a strong budget. Priority should be given to the proper implementation and combining of eco-schemes with other elements of the new green CAP architecture.
The IEEP report is available here.