A controversial draft report which advocated cutbacks in CAP spending after 2014 has now been ditched according to Farm Commissioner Mariann Fischer Boel. She denied having backed the report which called for agriculture to account for a lesser share of the EU budget that it does at present. Fischer Boel claimed that the paper was now a 'non paper' and was 'in the bin'.
However, the position may be a little less straightforward than it appears. It was a small group of Commission President Barosso's advisers that drafted the review with his explicit approval. With Barosso back for a second term it is quite likely that the final version of the budget review document, to the tabled in the New Year, will contain views not dissimilar to those in the draft, including linking Single Farm Payments more closely to the provision of public goods.
Budget Division sources indicated that just how much the CAP's budget will be reduced is still up for grabs, but considerable cuts are considered to be necessary to focus spending on other higher priority investment areas. These include climate change and the promotion of growth and jobs.
2 comments:
Wyn, if the EU were to deal once and for all with the CAP, then not only might the budget be less but it might be more acceptable to "real farmers" and consumers alike. Too much money currently goes to agro-conglomerates and food 'manufacturers' (ie those who transform the farmers' produce into marketable products, like yoghourt, etc). Not, by my book, "real farmers".
The best proposals I have seen so far are those of reformthecap.eu via their new "Reform the CAP Declaration". Far more helpful than any fiddling with budgets.
It has always been an issue with the CAP that too much money goes to companies of this sort and also to traders and not enough to the supposed beneficiaries. These interests form a powerful lobby.
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