BUDGET/AGRICULTURE : CAP THREATENED WITH MAJOR BUDGET CUTS.

"A further significant reduction in the overall share of the EU budget devoted to agriculture," less market intervention, direct aid "co-financed" by member states, increase in obligatory modulation and funds for "non-agricultural" rural development.These are the findings of the European Commission's draft communication on the reform of the Community's post-2013 budget. The commissioners are expected to respond, on 24 November, to the document, which does not, notably, classify the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) among its list of "high added value" Community policies of the future (see Europolitics 3842 on the draft communication and 3843 for an analysis of its new approach to cohesion).

Prefaced by European Commission PresidentaJose Manuel Barroso, the document reflects previous drastic proposals for new agricultural reforms. An approach shared with some of those working with the Agriculture Commissioner Mariann Fischer Boel, who is opposed to a partial renationalisation of the first pillar of the CAP and puts the case for maintaining a "sufficient" agriculture budget.

FROM 61% TO 32%

It is in this context that the Commission's draft firstly recalls that betweena1988 and 2013, "the overall share of direct agricultural support in the EU budget will have shrunk from 61% to 32%" and that according to the CAP's monitoring "this downward path is set to continue beyond 2013 even in a no-change scenario".

"For the future, further reform and modernisation of agricultural spending is required to bring it fully into line with the principles of European added value, concentration on priorities and fairness." The document continues: "While it is too early to define the detailed contours or the exact intensity of the future reform of the CAP, it is clear that it should be driven by two objectives. First, it should resolutely pursue the modernisation of the CAP, enabling it to respond to new challenges and concentrating spending where it adds most value. Second, it must stimulate a further significant reduction in the overall share of the EU budget devoted to agriculture, freeing up spending for new EU priorities".

The draft communication then states that "market intervention mechanisms could be rolled back further to become a genuine safety net". It reassures readers that "food supply to a growing global population could be guaranteed by raising agricultural productivity with intensified research, technical assistance and knowledge sharing".

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