March 23, 2011
It was entirely predictable that EU farm ministers would respond to the European Commission’s post 2013 CAP reform proposals by agreeing on a policy direction which would ensure that there can be no radical change in the Union’s €50+ billion a year common agricultural policy. What was however surprising, even to hardened farm council watchers,… » read more
Posted by Brian Gardner
March 16, 2011
The most recent meetings of the European Union’s farm ministers have given a pretty clear indication that any changes which may take place in the common agricultural policy are unlikely to be more than cosmetic. After much wrangling in the Special Committee on Agriculture (SCA) and in the Council of Ministers itself, a completely anodyne… » read more
Posted by Brian Gardner
March 7, 2011
Retail prices of food, according to a UK bank, have increased almost twice as much as they should have done as a result of recent food commodity price increases. Prices to consumers have increased far more than indicated by the small proportion of raw material cost in the total cost of processing and delivering. An… » read more
Posted by Brian Gardner
March 4, 2011
The European Commission’s approach to yet another upcoming reform of the common agricultural policy is largely devoted to the continuation of the current policy with a few added concessions to green pressures on the side. This approach is increasingly irrelevant at this stage in the development of European agriculture and in an increasingly unstable world… » read more
Posted by Brian Gardner
Commentary on European developments from the perspective of long term professional interest in European and international trade, agriculture and food policy, nurtured over three decades spent in Brussels observing and analysing the development of the CAP.
