The Presidents of IFA and COPA held a meeting yesterday with Taoiseach Micheál Martin to discuss the importance of a strong CAP as part of the next EU budget.
IFA President Francie Gorman and COPA President Massimiliano Giansanti emphasised that EU farmers need €500bn to build on-farm resilience, to encourage young people into our sector, to ensure food security and to enhance the sustainability of a very fragile sector.
The European Council, made up of Prime Ministers across the EU27, will meet in Dublin next week. The meeting will be chaired by the Taoiseach.
“We know the Irish Government will be chairing crucial MFF meetings over the coming weeks, but we also need them fighting for an increased CAP budget for Irish and European farmers,” he said.
IFA President Francie Gorman said the proposal is to currently allocate €293bn to the EU CAP budget.
“Wherever you farm across the EU, the message is the same: the CAP budget must be resolved. As things stand, Ireland stands to lose over €2.5bn from our CAP budget, which would mean a cut of 24%,” he said.
“At a time when global uncertainty is playing havoc with our costs, any cut to funding would be a devastating outcome for farmers, for food security, for the environment and for rural communities. Irrespective of the other pressures that exist in framing the next overall EU budget (known as the MFF), food security has to remain front and centre,” Francie Gorman said.
“We put tangible proposals on the table today, showing how the CAP budget can be increased. We need to see progress on this as well as a provision to ensure current CAP payments are maintained in the event of a transitionary period pending agreement of the next CAP programme advanced by the Irish Presidency,” he said.
IFA signed the CAP Stockholm Declaration in Sweden last month along with other farm leaders from across the EU27. It calls for a CAP budget maintained at least at its current level and adjusted for inflation, with genuinely ring-fenced funding. The CAP must remain a truly ‘Common’ policy, with its own dedicated and protected budget, if Europe is serious about safeguarding its farming sector and its single market.
