Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-02-10-Speech-1-117"
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"en.20030210.9.1-117"2
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"Mr President, Commissioner, what I actually would like to do is to address just a few points, as my colleagues have already had a lot to say. I believe that the difficulty we have, and that you in the Commission have in particular, is, in essence, the fact that you have to reconcile two different strategies. On the one hand, you have to implement reform in the European Union's agricultural production, and on the other, you have to improve developing countries' access to the market. That is of course extremely difficult, and is made more so by the very ambitious timetable, as you are required to be able to point to successes as soon as this year – successes in the Cancun negotiations. You must at least say in what direction you are taking us, and in doing so you also have to keep sight of your obligation to successfully conclude the negotiations in 2005. Add to that the complications with your trading partners, and the whole thing, taken together, amounts to a thoroughly tricky act.
I have looked at many documents and position papers from Germany, but also from other countries, so that what is here on the desk in front of me is a pot-pourri. On the one hand, much that is said is complimentary; people approve of the fact that something is happening at last, and that we are going in the right direction. On the other hand, there are also many reservations and concerns, with fears that the European Union will end up with the model of what I might summarise in general terms as a sort of ‘leisure agriculture’, and that we are to some extent losing sight of the need to be flexible enough to be truly competitive and to be able to compete internationally. We may well be able to do a great deal for the environment and agriculture, but there is the risk of other instruments falling by the wayside.
Commissioner, both you and Commissioner Fischler have, I believe, always said that we have enough room to manoeuvre. We have flexibility. We have to look at the details, perhaps at the milk prices for example, or in other areas, to see what else we might do.
Let me conclude with a very brief question. At a seminar of the Group of the Party of European Socialists last week, representatives of the developing countries kept referring to the development box, and expressed the desire that more be done about it. Perhaps you could say something about this."@en1
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