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EU states agree farm reform, but deal not yet done

March 20, 2013 07:30
European Union agriculture ministers agreed a plan to reform the bloc's often contested farm policy, its top budgetary item, after marathon talks winding up late Tuesday. Ireland, which currently holds the rotating EU presidency, hailed the deal struck after two days of talks as "an enormous step forward" and "a watershed moment" in months of efforts to reform the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) that accounts for 38 percent of the EU budget.

EU parliament moves to 'green' Europe's farms

March 13, 2013 14:19
European lawmakers on Wednesday approved plans for a radical overhaul of the EU's Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) by capping subsidies and tying them to environmental concerns. Members of the European Parliament notably agreed a sea-change in the European Union's controversial farming subsidies -- tying 30 percent of direct subsidies to respect for the environment. The measures include crop diversity, maintaining permanent pastures, and creating ecological fallows that are havens for plants, animals and insects on arable land.

Spanish farmers protest for EU subsidies

February 7, 2013 14:46
Farmers demonstrated in Madrid on Thursday against an overhaul of the European Union's agricultural policy in which they fear losing hundreds of millions of euros in subsidies each year. Hundreds of protesters, some dressed as cows and others in the orange T-shirts of their Union of Small Farmers which organised the demonstration, blew whistles and set off firecrackers as they marched through the streets of the Spanish capital. The farmers fear that subsidies from the European Union will be cut at a time when their revenues have fallen due to the economic crisis.

EU lawmakers vote to limit funds for biggest farms

January 23, 2013 13:15
* Parliament committee adopts position on farm policy reform * Politicians seek to delay sugar sector reform to 2020 * MEPs and governments to start talks on reform in March * Farm budget for 2014-2020 yet to be finalised By Charlie Dunmore

Cash crisis sucks life out of EU farm policy reform

January 21, 2013 09:15
* EU leaders likely to cut future farm budget by 10 pct * Politicians diluting farm policy reforms in response * Plans to leave more land fallow and rotate crops at risk * Move to liberalise EU sugar sector also facing delay By Charlie Dunmore BRUSSELS, Jan 21 (Reuters) - European Union politicians will scale back or ditch reforms to the farm subsidy system as they seek to mollify powerful farmers' lobbies angry at subsidy cuts forced on them by the bloc's debt crisis.
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