After years of cutting European farmers off at the knees with burdensome and sometimes downright ridiculous regulations, the EU is surprisingly about to announce “food security” as one of its priorities for the next five years, according to a leaked document.
The internal document, seen by Euractiv, calls for EU leaders to “ensure our food security through a vibrant agriculture sector”—the same agriculture sector that’s been hampered by Eurocrats to the point where farmers have been protesting in almost every European country in the past few months.
The new policy would be part of the EU’s Strategic Agenda, a program outlining Europe’s priorities for 2024-2029 and serving as a roadmap for all EU institutions. It is scheduled to be adopted by all 27 member states during the European Council meeting on June 27-28th.
Whether reflecting a true change of heart among EU leadership or a combination of massive farmer protests and the fact that the European elections are less than two months ahead, the draft text also dispenses with some of the language seen in the previous 5-year plan. Instead of goals such as “building a climate-neutral, green Europe,” “promoting sustainable agriculture,” and “calling on all EU countries to move forward and step up their climate action,” the text makes only a cursory reference to climate change, noting that the EU should prepare “for the new realities stemming from climate change.”
A study, published in early March this year, commissioned by the European Parliament’s Agricultural Committee, found that while food security “is not generally considered to be at risk,” the bloc relies far too heavily on imports from suppliers for its animal feed and fertilizers. According to the report, that very dependency makes the EU’s food system highly vulnerable to market and geopolitical disruptions.
To make the EU more autonomous, it therefore advocates for more farming to happen (of course using ‘sustainable’ practices, such as organic agriculture), while promoting a lower consumption of animal products.
Contradictory to the newfound interest in supporting a “vibrant agriculture sector,” the EU is simultaneously moving full steam ahead with a set of rules to curb deforestation. Under those, which took effect at the end of December of last year, Europe’s farmers will be required to prove their cows have not been tended on land that was deforested to make space for grazing.
The EU Regulation on deforestation-free supply chains, which prohibit imports of products produced on deforested land, “will apply even-handedly to products from both inside and outside the EU,” a press release stated.
In addition, farmers are strongly advised not to use animal feed containing soy or palm oil, the production of which is driving deforestation abroad, especially in Brazil and Indonesia.
EU farmers understandably feel unfairly targeted by the incoming rules since deforestation is not an acute problem within Europe but largely happens outside the bloc. Various farming groups have already joined with the food industry to push for delays and exemptions to the rules.
Some farmers, such as vice president of the European Council of Young Farmers Elisabeth Hidén, a Swedish cattle farmer, told Politico she will not be able to sell the meat once the EU’s rules kick in.
She fears that after their implementation, cutting down trees on their own land would be considered deforestation, and thus prohibit any meat or timber from that land from being sold on the EU market.
Noting that there are already strong environmental regulations in place, she warned that farmers would be devastated economically if their products were deemed unfit for sale.
Yet thus far, Hidén’s warnings (and those of many others) have gone unheeded by the European Commission as it goes full-steam ahead implementing its new rules.
