20 agriculture ministers sign letter calling for two-pillar CAP
20 agriculture ministers across EU member states, including Ireland, have written to the European Commission for Budget, Anti-Fraud and Public Administration calling for an adequate budget for the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP).
The member states participating in the Joint Declaration included: Austria; Belgium; Bulgaria; Croatia; Cyprus; Czechia; France; Greece; Hungary; Ireland; Italy; Latvia; Lithuania; Luxembourg; Poland; Portugal; Romania; Slovakia; Slovenia; and Spain.
The European Commission is understood to be planning a radical overhaul of the EU budget – the Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) – as part of which the commission is planning to merge its various funding programmes into a smaller number of funds, which would be allocated all together to member states.
This could not only see the merging of funding for both pillars of CAP, but potentially also the end of ringfenced funding for CAP, farm organisations have warned.
The declaration by the 20 agriculture ministers underlines 'the urgent need for an independent and forward-looking CAP capable of ensuring the sustainable competitiveness of the EU's agricultural sector while responding to market dynamics, societal expectations and territorial cohesion objectives'.
It reaffirmed 'the importance of maintaining a separate, strong and ring-fenced two-pillar architecture of the CAP which continues to provide a balanced and coherent framework'.
The declaration states: 'Pillar I remains vital in delivering fully EU funded direct support and market stability to all farmers, especially in the current geopolitical context, while Pillar II plays a key role in addressing demographic trends in rural communities, promoting rural development, investments to [modernise] farms and rural infrastructures, environmental protection and local innovation while supporting areas with natural constraints and specific disadvantages.'
Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Martin Heydon, who was among the ministers who endorsed the declaration, said: 'The joint statement by 20 EU agriculture ministers including myself underlines the fundamental importance of CAP as a common policy across the EU.
'I hope that the commission's proposals in July for the next EU budget (MFF) will take account of the unique role CAP plays in supporting the economic, social and environmental sustainability of farming and our rural communities, promoting innovative and competitive food production, and assuring European food security.
'We are calling on the European Commission to ensure that the next CAP has a dedicated and robust budget, maintaining its current two-pillar structure.'
Acknowledging Minister Heydon's statement, the president of Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers' Association (ICMSA), Denis Drennan, said that farmers would be reassured by the sentiments expressed.
He added that farmers would interpret them as the minister signalling Ireland's intention to veto any proposed 'merger' of the two existing pillars of CAP into a fund that would drain funding away from active farming and food production towards more environmentally ideological causes.
Drennan said that it is essential that the government remains steadfast and fully supports the ministers' position on CAP funding post-2027.
'Farmers will understand the minister's comments as underlining the Irish Government's commitment to maintaining both existing pillars and refusing to countenance any deductions – most specifically any deductions from the direct payments emanating from CAP through moving funding into wider funding models that would ultimately means less funding for Irish farming and the rural economy,' Drennan said.
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