On Monday February 24, Kaspars Gerhards, the Minister for Agriculture, will participate at a Ministerial conference to discuss topical issues of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). The conference will be held in Warsaw, Poland and it is planned that Ministers and representatives of Ministries from eight Member States as well as representatives from the European Commission - Janusz Wojciechowski, the Commissioner for Agriculture and Maciej Golubiewski, the head of the Commissioner’s office. During the visit in Poland, Kaspars Gerhards, the Minister, will also meet Andrzej Duda, the President of State of Poland.
At the Ministerial conference, the focus will be on CAP funding for the next period from 2021 to 2027, which must be sufficient for farmers to be able to implement the new, expanded environmental requirements. The Ministers will discuss how to implement the new environmental and climate objectives, set up within the European Green Deal, in agriculture. The key question of the discussion will be whether new resources will be necessary for implementation of the European Green Deal as well as will the adjustment of direct payments facilitate implementation of the European Green Deal.
Kaspars Gerhards, the Minister for Agriculture, when voicing Latvia’s position, will emphasize that growing public demands, regarding the environment and climate, are understandable and Latvia supports objectives of the European Green Deal. At the same time, we must realize that the environmental and climate standards, which farmers will be obliged to meet, will be expanded, increasing expenditures for farmers. Therefore, European Union must have an appropriate CAP in place and it must not be cut down.
Latvia will willingly make use of Latvian farmers’ potential and will get actively involved in implementation of the European Green Deal in order to achieve the highest environmental and climate objectives. To be able to do it, direct payments must be adjusted because the role of direct payments grows considerably in achieving of the EU environmental and climate objectives. Besides, it must be pointed out that requirements and conditions are the same for all the Member States, consecutive tasks are the same but the financial support from CAP differs among Member States even 4-5 times! This is illustrative of inequality in availability of support for Member States, and in the next period, Latvia must reach the average level of direct payments.
It is planned that in the conference will participate, Kaspars Gerhards, Latvian Minister for Agriculture, Andrius Palionis, Lithuanian Minister for Agriculture, Arvo Aller, Estonian Minister for Rural Affairs, Jan Krzystof Ardanowski, Polish Minister for Agriculture and Rural Development, Desislava Taneva, Bulgarian Minister for Agriculture, Food and Forestry, Miroslav Toman, Czech Minister for Agriculture, Istvan Nagy, Hungarian Minister for Agriculture and George Scarlat, the State Secretary of the Rumanian Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development .
Information prepared: Santa Vaļuma
Adviser to the Minister
Telephone: +371 20222000
E-pasts: Santa.Valuma@zm.gov.lv