The Under-Secretary of State responsible for Natural and Marine Environment, Wildlife and Rural Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for Ogmore (Huw Irranca-Davies), represented the United Kingdom at the Agriculture and Fisheries Council in Brussels on 25 May. Richard Lochhead and Michelle Gildernew also attended.
On fisheries there was an exchange of views on the Commission’s Green Paper on reform of the common fisheries policy, focusing on the main issues of concern to each member state, rather than a structured discussion on specific questions. There was much recognition of the need for widespread reform, with no member state supporting the status quo overall, however there was no real consensus about the detail of reform.
Under any other fisheries business, the Commission updated the Ministers on their thinking on tackling the problem of discards. Though they expressed disappointed at the rate of progress so far, they were optimistic that some improvement could be made without having to wait for the common fisheries policy to be reformed.
On agriculture the presidency presented draft Council conclusions on the simplification of the CAP which all Ministers could support. Sweden, as upcoming presidency, confirmed its intention to come back to the issue of CAP simplification at Agriculture Council in November, with a view to ensuring progress is made on concrete simplification proposals. The Commission welcomed the Council conclusions and confirmed that their officials were already analysing the 39 specific simplification suggestions made in the list compiled at the previous Agriculture Council. The presidency confirmed that the conclusions had been adopted.
There were a number of further items under any other business. France, Germany and Austria called for a range of new measures to ease perceived dairy sector woes.
France introduced a paper on the economic situation of pigmeat producers, arguing that export refunds should be reactivated, particularly given the strength of the euro and due to a decline in pigmeat consumption in some member states as a result of Novel Flu.
Poland tabled a paper expressing concerns about an increasing disparity between producer and consumer prices, complaining that farmers/producers were not benefiting from the increased consumer prices owing to the putative anti-competitive behaviour of large retail outlets.
Finland introduced a paper on the killing of livestock by carnivores (such as wolves, bears etc) whose populations had increased as a result of protection afforded under the Habitats Directive. They requested amendments to state aid rules to permit payments from national funds to be made to farmers to compensate them for such losses to livestock.
The presidency confirmed that the Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD) meeting in New York had reached consensus on a final document that agreed on the urgent need to increase efforts on international food security and sustainable agricultural development. The Netherlands, who chaired the meeting in New York, gave an update urging colleagues to ensure that sustainable agriculture remained a feature of their preparations for the Copenhagen Climate Conference.