‘Outdated, feudal agriculture’? EU and Hungary clash over the future of farming

The resources of the European Union’s Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) must be distributed more fairly so they are accessible for the most disadvantaged sectors and regions, Christophe Hansen, the European Commissioner for agriculture and food, said in Strasbourg on Thursday.

Speaking at a plenary discussion of the European Parliament on CAP’s future, Hansen said that in areas where livestock is the sole source of income, EU funding has a tangible added value. “Without agricultural activity, land abandonment will cause demographic, environmental and societal problems. In certain regions, we would even have a security problem…” such as in the Baltic states and Finland, he said, adding that agriculture there played a strategic role as well as an economic one.

He highlighted the importance of the EU’s cohesion policy as a means to ensuring “the right to stay”. “Investments in local infrastructure, transport, clean energy … broadband, health and education enhance economic and societal cohesion … by supporting what a community needs.”

The EC sees CAP and the EU’s cohesion policy as crucial to those aims, as well as to the EU’s food sovereignty, especially amid the current geopolitical tensions, he said. Farmers are active players in protecting the environment as well as in food production, Hansen said, calling for an EU policy equally supporting environmental and societal goals, and ensuring the development of rural areas.

He said CAP “helps provide a fair income for farmers, safe and affordable food for consumers and respect for the environment we work in”. “I fully agree that we need to maintain [CAP’s] coherent toolbox,” Hansen said. At the same time, he said “we need a CAP that is simpler and finds the right balance between incentives, investment and regulation and must ensure that farmers have a fair and sufficient income.”

With the CAP’s simplification package, “we have charted a way in that direction by streamlining overlapping requirements … and reducing red tape for our farmers and administrations,” he said, adding that he hoped that the EP would soon decide on the package so that “it can deliver for farmers already in the next calendar year.”