Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2002-05-29-Speech-3-139"
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"en.20020529.9.3-139"2
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"Mr President, like many other things in this world, if we were designing from the beginning a common agricultural policy today, I doubt very much it would take the shape or form we presently have. When I first became a Member of this Parliament, the Union was a lot smaller than it is today. There were 9 countries with 20 million farmers. Today the Union is much enlarged and there are only 6 million farmers.
So we have not succeeded in our original aim of maintaining the population in rural areas. Nevertheless, the people of the European Union have not seen the common agricultural policy as a great failure. They recognise that it has given us security of food supply. They recognise that the quality of that food has improved over the years and, in spite of the fact that, from time to time we have scares and always will, the consumers of the European Union are relatively happy that we have given them a safe product.
I would like to point out that while we spend, relatively modestly, something like 0.4% of the GDP of the Union on this policy, the farmers, for example in Denmark and the United Kingdom get an average of about EUR 19 000 per capita, but if you go down to the bottom of the list, the half a million small farmers of Portugal get EUR 1 500. So it is not a socially just policy. Ireland is somewhere in between at EUR 11 000 per capita. We have not succeeded in establishing a socially just situation.
Nevertheless, and in addition to having done what I said, we have also saved many rural areas; many habitations in towns, villages and communities have been saved by the policy. We must re-design it in a way that will make it more socially just. We must not forget that the business of agriculture is about producing food in the first place and we must ensure that food is safe.
Two things worry the farmers of Europe at the moment: the excessive paperwork they are required to do and the restrictions that are being imposed on them. Food is being imported from other areas like, for example tinned food, chicken and other things, for which they cannot guarantee the safety and they are not happy about this.
The third thing is that we cannot see the future because we cannot get an agreement with the Americans. We have to establish a system by which traceability of food, wherever it comes from, will be assured and we have to reach an understanding with our competitors in the world markets."@en1
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