The EU Debate on redesigning of CAP “in a flexible fashion” takes hold

EU farming ministers are urging the European Commission to advocate a more flexible-oriented approach in shaping the post-2027 Common Agriculture Policy. “Simplification shouldn’t mean generating more paperwork,” stated Zsolt Feldman, the Hungarian Minister of State for Agriculture and Rural Development. “I think there was consensus on that point, ” journalists told on the margins of the EU Agriculture Council in Brussels last Monday.

The ministerial meeting discussion revolved around “the need to speed up and make more flexible the modification of the Strategic Plans,” as a national delegated expert highlighted in a stocktaking document of the second year of implementation of the CAP strategic plans. They recommended lifting the zero tolerance for deviation from the target values set in the plans and reducing the reporting and explanation obligations.

The ministers are calling for a streamlined procedure for adopting and amending these plans, which set the roadmap for each country to achieve the CAP objectives. This call for efficiency was a key point of discussion during the ministerial meeting.

“Today’s discussion can be used for the post-2027 CAP Council conclusions that we have to adopt in October or November, ” Minister Feldman optimistically stressed during the press conference.
Some ministers also expressed concerns regarding implementing the deforestation regulation and developments linked to the trade dimension, including China’s anti-subsidy investigations.

“We have a ‘pragmatic’ position on the EU regulations on deforestation, which will come into force at the end of the year,” Italian Minister Francesco Lollobrigida told correspondents in Brussels. He stressed the need to guarantee, on the one hand, the environment and, on the other, the possibility of not stopping our production system, he added. “Currently, that regulation puts the entire production system in difficulty, not only the processing of products from agriculture but also others,” he further stated while suggesting the postponement of the entry into force of the text.

Ministers widely welcomed the Commission’s decision to sue the World Trade Organization to counter the investigation that the Chinese government launched against alleged unlawful subsidies to support the EU dairy sector through the Common Agriculture Policy.

Italy was also among the six countries – Bulgaria, Greece, Portugal, Romania, and Spain- that joined the group and asked the EU to reintroduce an automatic safeguard clause against zero-duty rice imports from Cambodia and Burma.

The excessive import of zero-duty rice (around 450,000 tonnes) from Asia, has so far been absorbed by the EU market ‘only because of the shortage of production’ in Europe’ due to the drought, especially in Spain and Italy’. However, the ministers stress that this situation will be ‘unsustainable in the near future’, making the need for immediate action clear.