Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2011-02-16-Speech-3-406-000"
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"en.20110216.15.3-406-000"2
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"Madam President, can I thank both the Council and Commission for a very clear statement of their intent on this very crucial issue of rising food prices. Those of us in the Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development who are in the Chamber today are more accustomed to debating agricultural matters at midnight. I am delighted that when agriculture suddenly becomes food, we debate this very important issue in the middle of the day when people can hear. I think we should remember this.
Let me say very clearly that the disconnect between agriculture and food is part of the problem that we are debating here today. The realities of agriculture and the low farm incomes in both Europe and the developing world are central to this debate and, lest we also forget, one of the crucial problems – and the Commission identified it in its position paper – is that rising commodity prices and rising food prices do not translate into higher farm incomes. The real problem is that the costs of producing food are rising faster, and this is a treadmill on which farmers cannot continue.
The challenge for us as policy-makers is how to increase food production in a sustainable way, how to produce more from less, how to manage our stocks and how to deal with the issue of stock dislocation that the Commissioner has identified. Global stocks are no longer the key figure; we need to know where the stocks are and to realise that they will not come out of China or India.
What we need to do – and I think this has started to happen since my report during the last Parliamentary term – is to put agriculture and food centre stage.
Let me finish by saying this: we need to be cautious as to how we reform our agriculture policy. We must maintain and increase food production within the European Union as part of our contribution to global food security. And yes, let me endorse your point about agriculture in the developing world: it has been neglected for far too long. It is now high time that our policies assisted that agriculture."@en1
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