A proposed single EU fund would “radically change farming’s main support toolbox, the CAP”, Elli Tsiforou told the large attendance of farmers at Tuesday night’s IFA CAP meeting.

“There is a very significant risk of having the Common Agricultural Policy dissolved,” she said.

Tsiforou is the secretary general of COPA-COGECA, the umbrella body for European farm organisations and agri-food co-operatives.

She said that in recent months, the EU budget and the new CAP have been “the elephant in the room” amidst the positivite interaction between farmers and the new European Commissioner for Agriculture Christophe Hansen.

Under European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen’s proposal, “member states would have a maximum flexibility to move funds between different policies,” Tsiforou explained, “without the CAP and its two pillars being secured and ring-fenced with a clear budget line and a dedicated budget”.

The proposal would mean a “27-speed EU” in terms of agricultural policy, she explained.

COPA-COGEGA will protest next Tuesday when the Commission, in the presence of president von der Leyen, will present and discuss its ideas on the next EU budget.

There might be a moment to change these “very negative scenarios”, she concluded.

CAP “peanuts”

“The EU budget is peanuts,” said former high-ranking Commission official Tassos Haniotis.

“It’s 1% of GDP, the CAP is 0.3% of GDP of the European Union, and 0.6% of total EU public expenditure.”

He highlighted that a 30% cut in CAP funds, as proposed in some quarters for defence and security spending, would only free up 0.1% of the EU’s GDP.

Haniotis had a few blunt messages for farmers, starkly warning that he saw no prospect of an increased CAP budget.

“The level of food costs is not going to go down,” he said, and with it have gone “all the gains over two generations in making food less costly for households”.