(Brussels, 05/03/2021) Numerous European farmers’, environmental and development organisations urge the Portuguese Presidency, the EU Member States and the European Commission to act now for climate, environment, developing countries and EU farmers. As the current reform of the Common Market Organisation (CMO) in the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) of the EU offers a very important opportunity for crucial improvements, the organisations call for the inclusion of articles from the European Parliament’s position in the CMO. As stated in the open letter by the organisations, these essential articles by the Parliament would “help increase the crisis-resilience of EU agriculture, promote overall sustainability and allow for a transition toward better food sovereignty.”
Referring to the EU trilogue negotiations currently underway and reminding the Council of its important role as co-legislator, the organisations stress that “With countless farmers and citizens taking to the streets, with many of the CMO reform articles receiving a clear majority in the EP’s plenary and with the ambitions of the European Green Deal and its strategies, the profound will and need for reform is evident.” Now would be the time in European agriculture to reduce harmful overproduction, to ensure compliance of imports with EU standards, and to introduce and improve monitoring and management tools. Furthermore, market disturbances should be prevented and not only managed, and transparency on agricultural markets should be improved.
According to the signatories, the proposed CMO articles – such as Article 219a and b, 218b and 222a – “contribute to the fight against the climate crisis, to a better coherence with development policy and to reaching the goals laid out in the Green Deal, but they also help make Europe’s agriculture fairer and future-proof.” They consider this contribution indispensable as the “climate and biodiversity crises are only getting worse and third countries are suffering from the adverse effects of the EU’s dominant agricultural model. At the same time, numerous studies point out that many farmers have not received cost-covering prices in years.”
Therefore, the organisations conclude: “In light of the manifold challenges, which we urgently need to tackle, an appropriate legal CMO framework is the only way to avoid recurring crises and to bring long-term stability to the EU agricultural sector. (…) It is time to act and deliver.”
You can find the full letter here: Time to deliver a framework for a balanced agricultural sector: Act for a CMO that respects climate, biodiversity and farmers in Europe and beyond!
The signatory organisations are the European umbrella organisations of farmers European Milk Board and European Coordination Via Campesina, the environmental and organic farming organisations Friends of the Earth Europe and IFOAM as well as the development organisations Oxfam Solidariteit, SOS Faim and Vétérinaires sans frontières.
Contacts:
EMB director Silvia Däberitz (EN, DE, FR): +32 (0)2 808 1936
EMB policy advisor and press office Simon Bauer (EN, DE, FR): +32 (0)2 808 1934
