French Minister of Agriculture Marc Fesneau called on Wednesday in Brussels to quickly “simplify” the procedures of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), the complexity of which the sector criticizes, promising proposals with other member states. “We cannot have a CAP that is so complex and incomprehensible, sometimes both for our administrations and our farmers. We need to resolutely commit to the path of simplification,” he told the press. .
As agricultural protests intensify in France in unison with other countries, he met in Brussels with his Belgian counterpart, MEPs, and the European Commissioners for the Internal Market and Agriculture. “You have farmers today who do not know why the aid they receive. It is not a question of waiting for the new post-2027 CAP,” added Marc Fesneau.
“Transform immediately and simplify immediately”
The Twenty-Seven “must think about what we can immediately transform and simplify, the adjustments to make taking into account the realities of the markets, geopolitical and climatic realities,” he explained. Pointing out that climate change, with its extreme and unpredictable episodes, sometimes made the timetable imposed by European regulations inapplicable. If France tackles the revision of its national rules, the same project must be carried out at the European level, he insists.
Among the Member States, “we have a collective demand for simplification, I feel that the Commission hears this message. But we need very concrete things”, insists the minister. He mentions “the exemptions, the forms to be completed, the certificates requested” even when satellite monitoring is planned – which “could make it possible to simplify the procedures”. “These were things that we were preparing for and on which we must accelerate: with other European countries, we will take initiatives to make a series of general proposals and specific proposals on the question of controls,” he said. He underlines.
“Flexibilities”
Another pitfall: the 2023-2027 CAP grants increased “flexibilities” to States to adapt to local specificities, at the risk of having more or less complex and strict standards from one country to another, potential internal competition . “We do not all have the same cultures or the same constraints”, but “this can be a source of distortions, if not of competition, at least of practices. This is an element on which we must question ourselves”, recognizes Marc Fesneau . To remedy this, the CAP could impose “an obligation of results”, rather than means, he suggests.
Finally, the relaxation proposed on Wednesday by Brussels on the fallow obligation “is a first important signal” to “say that the (environmental) transition does not equal decline”, “opening the way to other reflections” on the other environmental constraints of the CAP, notes the minister.