After the visit by US President Donald Trump last week, it was clear the chemistry between the leader of the free world and Europe wasn’t there. This was verbalised by German Chancellor Angela Merkel when she said: “Europe must take our fate into our own hands.”

This is widely interpreted as being a reference in the main to defence and President Trump’s less than enthusiastic support for NATO. This, combined with the UK’s decision to leave the EU, means the EU 27 is looking towards self-reliance, built on a strong French-German core.

Defence is a key element of security, but there is an even greater priority that is often overlooked in this debate – a sustainable supply of food.

Thanks to the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), the EU has enjoyed an abundant food supply for over half a century. This is a contrast to the 1950s when food rationing was in place in many European countries. While it is far from perfect, the CAP has achieved the objective of sustained food supply from a network of family-based farms across Europe.

As the EU ventures into the latest CAP reform, it would do well to reflect Chancellor Merkel’s comments on “taking our fate into our own hands”. Just as it makes sense that the EU shouldn’t sub-contract its military defence to others such as the US, we should also not sub-contract our sustainable supply of food to other areas of the world. Given what happened in Brazil in March, and subsequent investigations into JBS, the case for taking responsibility for our food supply in-house to the EU couldn’t be clearer.

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