News

The European Parliament’s Agriculture and Rural Development Committee has approved two opinions on trade negotiations with Australia and New Zealand. The documents are available here and here.

During Parliament’s first plenary sitting of October, MEPs will take stock of the progress in the Brexit talks. A draft resolution on the progress in the first four rounds of Brexit talks with the UK will be voted on Tuesday. The EU wants to see significant progress on three specific issues before it starts discussions on the future relationship, namely citizens’ rights, the financial settlement, and Ireland.

The situation for the coming post quota years is analysed in the Commission's medium term outlook report. This outlook estimates that between 2016 and 2026 sugar production will increase by 6%. Isoglucose production could triple from 700 000 tonnes to 2.3 million tonnes. Imports will continue to drop from 3.0-3.5 million to 1.8 million tonnes and exports are expected to increase from 1.3 million tonnes to 2.5 million tonnes. Read more

Environment MEPs have called on Parliament to veto an EU Commission proposal to exempt some chemicals from the scope of criteria for identifying endocrine disruptors in pesticides. MEPs say in a resolution voted on Thursday that the Commission has exceeded its mandate by proposing to exempt some substances, such as pesticides deliberately designed to attack a target organism’s endocrine system, from the scope of scientific criteria for identifying endocrine disrupters.

French President Emmanuel Macron laid out his vision for Europe in a major speech at the Sorbonne yesterday (26 September). Macron revealed a dozen or so proposals on the future of the EU. He also called for a revision of the Common Agricultural Policy in order to bring about a significant agricultural transition. The full speech (in French) is here, the official English summary here.