The Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics (ABARE) has long been a consistent critic of the CAP. In its latest report The European Union’s Agricultural Policy: A Stocktake of Reforms it acknowledges the EU’s reform efforts to date, but highlights areas where more needs to be done. Its main conclusion is that, while the EU has been changing the form of its agricultural support policies toward ‘decoupled’ payments, very little has been done to reduce the level of support. In particular, substantial support and protection have been retained through tariffs and tariff quotas, and member states have retained some ‘coupled’ payments.… Read the rest
Good prospects for dairy reform
A particular milestone in the CAP was passed last month when the European Commission set export refunds on dairy products to zero for the first time ever in the management of the EU dairy regime. This reflects the extraordinary jump in world market prices for milk products in the past twelve months, with prices for skim milk powder more than doubling in US dollar terms.
Source: USDA Dairy: World Markets and Trade July 2007… Read the rest
Set aside: act now, think later…
Following a Swedish proposal and widespread support in the Agriculture Council, the Commission announced the intention to set the level of compulsory set aside at 0% for the 2008 harvest. This is bad news for Europe’s wildlife and suggests a disappointing level of commitment to environmental sustainability on the side of the EU and its Member States. It also seems like a textbook case of ill conceived decision making. … Read the rest
The dairy paradox
British dairy farmers are leaving the industry in large numbers, but world milk and milk product prices are heading upwards fast. How can one explain this paradox? The simple answer is, of course, that the key UK liquid milk market is largely insulated from world market factors.… Read the rest
Horse paddocks get SFP
In the long run it is going to be difficult to justify a Single Farm Payment (SFP) model that is based on historical receipts. This model originated in the generous compensation given to cereal farmers for cuts in intervention payments in the 1992 MacSharry reforms. There will be a shift to a regional model with a flat rate payment per hectare in each region. This is already under way in England, Finland and Germany and all the new member states have a flat rate payment system.… Read the rest
Corridor politics secure fruit and veg deal
The fruit and vegetable reform agreement is another step on the road to a more market oriented CAP. Yet in some ways it is more significant in terms of how it was secured and what it reveals about decision-making in an EU with 27 member states.… Read the rest
CAP policy instruments and policy goals: cause or effect?
Fellow blogger Wyn Grant presented a paper in Paris last month which presents a wide-ranging overview of the changes in CAP policy instruments since its inception to the present day. His basic thesis is that over time the instruments have changed much more than the objectives and that this does reflect a shift in the content of the CAP and its ultimate goals. He concludes that it is changes in CAP policy which have led to changes in policy instruments, although he does cite some examples where the introduction of new instruments, possibly by creating obvious anomalies, can spark off wider policy debates (trading SFP entitlements, voluntary modulation).… Read the rest
Fischer Boel sets course for CAP Health Check
Speaking at a meeting of the Parliamentary Agriculture Committee in Nicosia, Cyprus on 29 June, Agriculture Commissioner laid out her current thinking on the future of the CAP, in particular the changes she will be proposing later this year for the CAP Health Check.… Read the rest
UK Conservatives endorse the CAP
John Gummer MP, the former UK Agriculture Minister who is currently advising Conservative Party leader David Cameron on farm policy, has taken a swipe those in his party who call for a repatriation of the EU’s common agricultural policy:
… Read the rest“There is no doubt at all that unless we get a kind of common deal in the EU farmers will get no money at all. No British government of any kind is prepared to foot the bill. Anybody who dares to talk about repatriation doesn’t care about farming because you won’t have it.”
Sarko’s hard line could have a paradoxical end
The hard line being taken by France’s new president, Nicolas Sarkozy, on the future of the CAP could have a paradoxical outcome: further re-nationalisation of the policy once seen as the cornerstone of the European Union.… Read the rest