Reforms of the Common Fisheries Policy and the Common Agricultural Policy
- Author(s):
- Parliamentary Assembly
- Origin
- Text adopted by
the Standing Committee, acting on behalf of the Assembly, on 27
May 2011 (see Doc. 12607,
report of the Committee on the Environment, Agriculture and Local
and Regional Affairs, rapporteur: Mr Korkeaoja).
- Thesaurus
1. Convinced that access to safe and
nutritious food is a basic human right, the Parliamentary Assembly raises
this important issue with a view to providing policy guidance to
member states, especially in the current political context of ongoing
reforms of the European Union’s Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) and
Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) and their possible impact on non-European
Union member states of the Council of Europe.
2. Food security has become a growing political issue worldwide.
The challenge will be to produce and supply enough safe and nutritious
food in a sustainable way for a growing global population, which
is projected to reach 9 billion people by 2050. According to the
United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), the demand
for food is projected to increase by 40% by 2030 and by 70% by 2050.
On a per capita basis, food production
in the least developed countries is already struggling to keep up
with rapid population growth.
3. Due to globalisation and past European Union orientation towards
intensive agricultural production with single-crop farming on the
one hand, and following several decades of overfishing and declining
fish stocks on the other hand, self-sufficiency in food production
has become extremely rare. Most countries rely today on both import
and export markets to feed their population and the supply chain
consequently has become very sensitive to both economic and environmental
factors. Biodiversity loss and climate change will inevitably pose additional
severe risks to food security and to the viability of the agriculture
and fisheries sectors.
4. Over the past decades, the Common Agricultural Policy has
been criticised for its high cost, its incentives to over-production
and its distorting impact on food prices on world markets, but above
all for increasing intensive farming – such as single-crop farming
and intensive livestock breeding – harmful to Europe’s environment.
5. Intensive farming has increased pollution of soil, water and
air, fragmentation of habitats and loss of wildlife. It has also
engendered high energy consumption leading to high levels of greenhouse
gas emissions. Wider structural change in the past has also led
to the loss of labour-intensive farms, replaced by resource-intensive
farms, with considerable impacts not only on the environment, but
also on employment.
6. The Assembly deplores the fact that 85% of CAP direct payments
go to just 18% of farmers, with the largest farms in the old European
Union member states (EU-15) benefiting the most. Furthermore, some farmers
working in the most disadvantaged areas receive the smallest payments.
7. Moreover, CAP expenditure was capped for the period 2004-2013,
with the result that the inclusion of farming sectors of the 12
new member states has taken place at a constant cost and resulted
in a very distorting and discriminating situation between old and
new European Union member states. Total direct payments received
in the new European Union member states (EU-12) currently represent
only 12.14% compared to 87.86% of the total payments received by
the old European Union member states (EU-15).
8. The Assembly deplores this situation of inequity since there
is no level playing field within the Single Market; in several new
European Union member states, following the unequal distribution
of direct payments within the CAP, local producers have lost ground
even in their domestic markets.
9. The Common Fisheries Policy has been criticised for mismanagement
and malfunctioning of its quota systems, which in practice have
often led to illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing and discards
at sea of up to 50%. According to the International Council for
the Exploration of the Sea, 88% of European fish stocks are over-fished,
compared to 25% elsewhere in the world. The Assembly condemns the
industry’s reliance on immature catches before the age of reproduction
and regrets that overfishing and certain trawling techniques have
also led to degradation of the marine environment.
10. The Assembly therefore considers that both the CAP and the
CFP have to gradually evolve towards a broadening of their objectives
and a redefinition of their policy approaches in order to meet the
food security, environmental, biodiversity, climate, energy, rural
and coastal development challenges of the 21st century. In addition,
they have to help the farming and fisheries sectors remain economically
and socially viable and become more sustainable, competitive and
robust to cope with the economic crisis and increasingly volatile prices
set by the global markets.
11. In view of the above considerations, the Assembly recommends
the following policy guidelines to the member and non-member states
of the Council of Europe, and particularly to the member states
of the European Union:
11.1 introduce
in the forthcoming CAP and CFP reforms more general and simpler
rules at European level, concentrating on overarching principles
and objectives;
11.2 reinforce the policy definition and management at regional
level in order to adapt to the extremely diverse agricultural and
fishing circumstances in the enlarged European Union;
11.3 while negotiating the CFP and particularly the CAP budget
for the next funding period (2014-2020), reach a more equitable
division of direct payments between old and new European Union member
states in order to redress the current imbalance and achieve a level
playing field for all producers within the Single Market;
11.4 encourage the negotiating parties to achieve a radical
shift, both in the overall objective setting for the CAP and the
CFP and in the definition of their delivery mechanisms, in order
to fine-tune the European Agricultural Model and the European Fisheries
Model so as to deploy sustainable practices that can provide long-term
optimal yields, while using natural resources efficiently;
11.5 reinforce consistency of the first and second pillars
of the CAP, and also between support systems under the second pillar
and under the European Union structural funds;
11.6 defend the principle of family farms and small-scale coastal
fisheries and set up a differentiated support regime within the
CAP and the CFP which is adapted to their particular needs;
11.7 further develop support schemes for farmers and fishermen
in disadvantaged areas and make more extensive use of such incentives
in the member states to prevent land abandonment and depopulation
in those areas in order to maintain agriculture in all areas of
Europe;
11.8 set up special schemes to help young professionals in
the farming and fisheries sectors to meet high start-up costs (access
to credit, insurance, and so on);
11.9 reconcile the objectives of the CAP and CFP with the common
trade policy, make prices more transparent at all stages of the
distribution and processing of agricultural products and foodstuffs
and enable producers to have a greater bargaining power in the food
supply chain vis-à-vis the processing, distribution and retailing
sectors;
11.10 consider the impact of the CAP and the CFP on third countries,
including Council of Europe member states;
11.11 respect international humanitarian law (including the
Hague Regulations concerning the Laws and Customs of War on Land),
which stipulates that occupying powers cannot make use of natural resources
in occupied territories without prior consultation with the local
population and without it being in its interest;
11.12 within the Common Fisheries Policy, it would be necessary
to:
11.12.1 manage fish stocks with long-term plans and with
the primary objective of reaching maximum sustainable yields, preferably
by 2015;
11.12.2 design a two-edged fishing fleet policy, consisting of
a one-off temporary fleet overcapacity reduction scheme and a subsequent
fleet renewal scheme requiring large reductions of active fishing
vessels;
11.12.3 invest in research and innovation in order to establish
accurate scientific databases to achieve sustainable management
of fish stocks and natural resources;
11.12.4 eliminate discards by innovative gear design and fishing
practices and the requirement to land all catches and count them
against quotas;
11.12.5 develop strong incentives and enforcement mechanisms to
encourage “responsible behaviour at sea” by fishermen;
11.12.6 reinforce and harmonise control mechanisms for the elimination
of illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing and fully implement
a culture of compliance;
11.13 within the Common Agricultural Policy, it would be necessary
to:
11.13.1 reinforce the concept of multifunctionality of
agriculture which delivers public goods and has positive externalities,
such as the protection of the environment and natural resources,
rural development, stewardship of landscape, and food quality and
safety;
11.13.2 reward good environmental practice, taking into account
biodiversity and ecosystem functionality criteria;
11.13.3 increase the use of agri-environmental payments under
the second pillar of the CAP and develop special support schemes
for organic farming and high nature value farming and the farming
of traditional breeds and varieties;
11.13.4 apply general principles of integrated production, and
in particular encourage mixed crop farming and crop rotation, and
re-establish the link between crop farming and livestock breeding;
11.13.5 invest in research and innovation (agronomy);
11.13.6 encourage local initiatives of co-operation at the level
of river basins (systems) with a view to achieving “good status”
in European freshwater systems and adjacent coastal waters;
11.13.7 protect farmland from pressures of urban sprawl;
11.13.8 encourage local production closest to the consumer and
accommodate the needs of short food chains by, inter alia, adapting the cross-compliance
system and allowing more flexibility regarding food safety and hygiene
standards;
11.13.9 adopt a genuine quality policy for agricultural products,
ensuring minimum quality standards for all products and promoting
high-end quality products, notably through quality guarantee schemes
such as the PDO (protected designation of origin), PGI (protected geographical
indication) and TSG (traditional specialities guaranteed) schemes,
or the new “Euroleaf” logo for products derived from organic farming;
11.13.10 improve traceability to allow consumers to make informed
choices and raise public awareness, particularly of young people,
with regard to dietary habits and choices.
