The European Parliament wants to significantly expand and make the European Commission’s food strategy more future-oriented. In Strasbourg, the MEPs – sometimes with minor differences – adopted several dozen amendments.
A report by Dutch MEP Anja Hazekamp (Party for the Animals) containing 48 amendments, previously approved by the ENVI/AGRI committees, was adopted unchanged. With one addition, explicitly requesting impact assessments.
As a result, the farm to fork food strategy appears set to become largely mandatory for farmers. Clarity on this will emerge from the final vote on Wednesday. International trade agreements must also be adjusted to prevent unfair import competition.
One of the tightening measures is making the reduction targets for pesticide and antibiotic use, proposed last year by Timmermans, binding. EU subsidies may also no longer be used to promote the consumption of ‘red meat’.
Although the amendments adopted now tighten the plans of Climate Commissioner Timmermans and Food Commissioner Kyriakides, it is not expected that the entire European Parliament will fully reject the strengthened version on Wednesday. Commentators see this as a significant step forward toward reforming European agricultural policy. In the corridors of Strasbourg, it is even described as a turning point.
Thus, the European Parliament accepts the European Commission’s call to make at least 25 percent of European agriculture organic by 2030 (this is not an obligation). It was decided that, prior to this, a financial impact study must be conducted, as with other legislative proposals. Protests from opponents citing too much uncertainty were largely unsupported.
The majority stance of the European Parliament that at least half less chemicals should be used in agriculture within ten years is likely to cause challenges in the coming years. But the fact that climate and environmental aspects must play a decisive role in European agricultural policy has moved significantly closer with this vote.
Regarding the size of the livestock populations in EU countries, the MEPs stated that these herds must ensure ‘less emissions’ and ‘less land use.’ Such decisions were unthinkable in many EU countries just a few years ago.
Commissioners Timmermans and Kyriakides must now come forward with concrete legislative proposals, which Agriculture ministers will still have their say on. Nonetheless, it is expected that Agriculture Commissioner Janusz Wojciechowski and EU agricultural associations will have to accept this new direction.
The European Parliament formulated these recommendations based on a note from Dutch MEP Anja Hazekamp. This politician from the Party for the Animals was co-rapporteur for the EP on this dossier. By a margin of only five votes, she also succeeded in having the European Parliament address the dangers of zoonoses in the spread of diseases by animals.
An aide to the MEP considered the outcome of this vote a success and a decisive shift in course; not so much for Dutch agricultural standards but especially for agriculturally oriented countries in Central and Eastern Europe.