News

French President Emmanuel Macron warned last week that there could be an immediate food crisis in connection with the war in Ukraine. To prevent this crisis, France has introduced a new plan called the "Mission for Food and Agricultural Resilience", which has already been presented to the G7 countries. The plan is based on three pillars - ensuring that countries withstand export bans or restrictions to ensure the proper functioning of the global agricultural market; increase agricultural production to ensure production for the regions in need; increase in production in the states most at risk from the crisis (focusing, inter alia, on production in Africa).
More information is available here.

On 29/03/2022, the Commission launched feedback on an action plan for better nutrient management. The loss of nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphorus lead to environmental pollution, existing regulations are not sufficient to address this problem, so the initiative aims at wider food security, protect human health, and preserve the ecosystem. The consultation is open until 26/04/2022, available here.

The European Commission published on 23/03/2022 a Communication on food security and strengthening the resilience of food systems. The Communication also includes several short- and medium-term measures to secure global food supplies and help EU farmers and consumers cope with rising food prices and input costs. The Commission states in its Communication that the EU stands ready to do its utmost to contribute to global food security, especially in Ukraine, North Africa, the Middle East, Asia, and sub-Saharan Africa. According to the Communication, food availability in the EU is not currently jeopardized because, because the EU is largely self-sufficient in many agricultural products.
More information is available here.

On 23/03/2022, the European Commission adopted a delegated act pursuant to Article 219 of the CMO Regulation, which aims to provide exceptional support to the agricultural sector in the context of unforeseen developments in agricultural markets. The support package totalling €500 million also includes an agricultural crisis reserve (€479 million). The resources for each Member State have been redeployed according to their respective weights in the agricultural sector. The largest aid was allocated to France (€90 million) and Germany (€60 million). Given the scale of the current crisis, it will exceptionally be possible to supplement this EU support up to 200% with national funding, bringing the total funding to as much as €1.5 billion.

On 23/03/2022, the European Commission published measures to promote private storage for pigmeat. The aim is to stabilise markets, which are currently weakened due to the low demand for European pork exports to third countries. The use of the measure can be requested in the period from 25/03/2022 to 29/04/2022 with the possibility of storage for 60, 90, 120 or 150 days.