The German Farmers' Association (DBV) has called on national and regional agriculture ministers to establish a national reserve of artificial fertilizer for the year 2023. The DBV also requests a temporary suspension of the environmental tax on energy and fuel from Berlin.
DBV chairman Joachim Rukwied made his appeal at the semi-annual Agriculture Ministers Conference (AMK) held this week, which concludes tomorrow. He drew a comparison with the gas and oil reserves that EU countries will need to build up in the coming months.
The DBV chief urged Agriculture Minister Cem Özdemir to take measures to secure the food supply and control costs.
The German Farmers' Association (DBV) warned of supply bottlenecks for fertilizers. In the short term, sufficient production capacity for nitrogen fertilizers must be maintained in case Russian gas supplies are interrupted. "If failures occur, significantly lower harvests will be inevitable from 2023 onwards," he emphasized.
To reduce costs, the farmers' association expects a temporary suspension of the energy tax on fuels. Rukwied sees the aid package announced last week by the German coalition government as the first important step in relieving the agricultural sector.
In addition, the DBV calls on the German government to fully implement all relaxations in the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) that the European Commission introduced in mid-March. "We must utilize the existing potential for food production in Europe to guarantee sufficient availability of raw materials."