The discussion about the reform of the Common Agricultural Policy has been sharpened by the war in Ukraine. The disappearance of Russia and Ukraine causes problems in the supply of certain raw materials.
Sustainability and greening in the agricultural sector are paramount, while food security is pushed into the background. That has been the trend in the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) in recent decades. A dangerous development, given current geopolitical developments. There is a group that is concerned about short-term food security and believes that immediate measures should be taken to increase agricultural production. For the longer term, they stand for a revision of the CAP, in which food security must be central. Supporters argue that the current rules and planned measures and reforms should be continued in order to become less dependent.
Take action
In the short term, there is a group of member states that advocate direct measures to compensate for the loss of raw materials from Ukraine and Russia. Hungary and Bulgaria, for example, have already imposed export restrictions on grain. France and Italy, among others, want to introduce measures that will allow farmers to increase production of crops this season, on which the European Union now depends, and also relax European rules.
Italy's Agriculture Minister, Stefano Patuanelli, is perhaps the most outspoken, arguing that fallow land and all permanent grassland should be able to be used for more productive crops. These are measures that are not permitted in order to qualify for a subsidy from the CAP. In addition, Italy is exploring the possibility of relaxing legal restrictions on irrigation and calling for additional support for farmers to absorb higher production costs. Patuanelli calls on the European Union to set up an extraordinary subsidy scheme for this, a bit like the support package during the corona crisis.
Vision
For the longer term, this group advocates a thorough revision of the new CAP that will be introduced in 2023. The current setup - which includes mandatory fallow, reduction of the use of crop protection products and fertilizers and an expansion of the organic area to 25% - costs production and therefore endangers food security. France, Italy and Slovakia, among others, believe that the Common Agricultural Policy must therefore be adjusted and that production and food security must again take center stage.
The proponents of the measures in the new policy argue that sustainability and greening are necessary to become more independent of means of production such as fertilizer or crop protection products. They therefore see no point in radically changing the plans. The European Commissioner for Agriculture, Janusz Wojciechowski, and European Commissioner Frans Timmermans (the architect of the Green Deal), among others, want to refine the details, but believe that the main points should remain intact.
Fundamental choices
However, according to experts, the current discussion about food security forces us to think beyond just the issues of the day. The fundamental question that is less discussed is: how do we organize the agricultural complex? Taking land out of production for nature and biodiversity goals and other production limiting measures is at odds with food security. But focusing primarily on food security - which is now being advocated again - will eventually result in relatively large stocks. This has proven disastrous in the past for price formation and therefore returns in the agricultural sector.
The war has once again forced the European Union to realize that food security cannot be taken for granted. It is a delicate balance between food production, biofuel production, sustainability and green ambitions, among other things, and that balance has been significantly disrupted in recent weeks. This requires immediate action, but also puts the discussion about the revenue model of the agricultural sector in a new light.