News

Both the European Parliament and the Council of the EU have adopted their views on a draft regulation on the transparency and sustainability of risk assessment in the food chain in recent weeks. The trialogues of the EP, the Commission and the EU Councils should be launched at the beginning of next year under the Romanian Presidency. But this week, the Netherlands voiced concerns about a draft regulation which, according to NL, could jeopardize the development of innovation in small and medium-sized food businesses. Renate Sommer (EPP, DE) rapporteur for the European Parliament's report resigned last week, replaced by Spanish MEP Pilar Ayuso Gonzáles (EPP).

The Commission issued on 18. 12. 2018 Commission’s Implementing Decision (EU) 2018/2015 from 17 December 2018 amending Annex Implementing Decision 2014/709 / EU on animal health control measures relating to African swine fever in certain Member States. The Implementing Act is available here here.

The Commission issued on 21. 12. 2018 Commission’s Implementing Regulation (EU) 2018/2044 from 19 December 2018 amending Regulation (EC) no. 1484/95 as regards determining the representative prices in the poultry meat and eggs, as well as for egg albumin. The Implementing Regulation is available here.

Ministers of agriculture met on 17-18/12/2018 in the EU Council of Ministers, one of the subjects discussed was the reform of the Common Agricultural Policy after 2020. The Austrian Presidency presented a progress report to the Council, which was generally supported; however, it will be necessary to address issues of implementation of the new policy implementation mechanism, the focus of the CAP on results, or horizontal issues. Nonetheless, the Council's final position will only be formed after an agreement has been reached on the main chapters of the legislative proposal for the Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) to be negotiated by October 2019. For this reason, a number of representatives of the Member States has expressed support for the introduction of transitional measures (over a transitional period) in order to avoid sudden falls in payments to farmers.

From the meetings of the Ministers of Agriculture of the EU Member States:

• Opposition to budget cuts – BE, IT, FR, PL, BG, CY, IE, ES, CZ, SI, LT, EE, HR, GR, LU
• Introduction of measures for a transitional period – ES, PT, CY, LT, BG, HU, GR, CZ
• Support for external convergence and harmonization of payments – LV, LT, EE, PT, SK, PL, GR
• Rejection of external convergence of direct payments – MT, BE, SI
• Support for strengthening of climate objectives – SI, IE, SE, HU, FR, NL (NL – up to 40% of the CAP budget)
• Support for simplification – AT, DE, IT, FR, GR
• Strengthening of effective risk management tools – CZ, IE, FR
• Strengthening the role of women in agriculture – SE, ES
• Promoting voluntary capping – SK, BG
• Cross compliance rules should not apply to small farmers – IT, PT
• The cross compliance rules should apply to all farmers regardless of their size – DK

The European Parliament presented its draft reports on the different parts of the draft legislative package on the CAP on 21/11/2018, 4,810 amendments were sent to the draft reports by 03/12/2018. The amendments should be translated into all the official languages of the EU by 18/01/2019 at the latest, and the rapporteurs should draft an updated version of the draft reports in January and February. Proposals should then be voted on in the EP Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development either on 11/03/2019 or on 18/03/2019, during the Plenary Session of the EP at the end of April 2019.

The European Parliament, the Council and the Commission reached today a political agreement on a new set of rules that will ensure protection of 100% of EU farmers and of a very large majority of EU agri-food companies against practices contrary to good faith and fair dealing. Following today's agreement, a vote will now take place in the European Parliament and the Council to formally endorse the text. Once fully adopted, Member States will have to transpose the new legislative text into their national law.

The Ministers of Agriculture of the Member States of the European Union will meet at the Council of Ministers in Brussels on 17-18/12/2018, the main focus of the discussion will be the package of the CAP reform measures after 2020 - the Presidency progress report and the updated EU bioeconomy strategy. Other topics will include, for example, information from the Presidency on massive forest damage in Europe, or information from Hungary on the BIOEAST bio-economics conference.