On December 13 and 14, at the EU Council of Ministers for Agriculture and Fisheries, the EU Member States discussed the Communication from the European Commission on Contingency plan for ensuring food supply and food security in times of crisis.
Covid-19 pandemia clearly showed some areas in food supply where some improvements are needed at the EU level, for example, coordination of the EU institutions, restriction of trade in food on the global scale, communication among policy makers. To improve EU readiness for risks, which might endanger the EU food supply and provision with food, the EU Commission has developed the EU Contingency plan for food supply, incorporating some activities to be implemented from mid 2022 to 2024, for example, setting up the group of experts on the European Food Security Crisis Preparedness and Response Mechanism; developing a suitable digital platform for exchange with information, mapping the expected challenges for the EU food supply chain and its critical infrastructure; developing various recommendations for crisis situations, etc.
Edgars Kronbergs, the Parliamentary Secretary of the Ministry of Agriculture: “Latvia supports the emphasis made in the Commission’s conclusions that further activities at the EU level must be based on the existing policy instruments as well as a specific situation of each Member State must also be properly considered.”
The Council meeting, at lengthy discussions far into the night, adopted the new Regulation on fishing opportunities for 2022 in the EU waters and outside of the EU waters, where fishing opportunities available for Latvia for the next year have also been included, in waters of international fishing organizations and international agreements in Northern part of Atlantic Ocean.