EU Agrifish Council agree on banning the purchase of agricultural products under production costs - Farmers call for action to back up promises

This measure was put on the agenda thanks to an information paper sent by Slovakia and supported by several Eastern European countries [2], and the demand is shared by EU food producer and farm worker organisations across the board. Ensuring prices that cover production costs has been at the centre of farmers’ demands all across Europe since last year’s protests, which called for more farmers and better prices.

Now, farmers are calling for action to back up the words of support expressed in the AGRIFISH meeting.

We urge the EU Commission to take heed of what Member States are asking for, by starting a fast-track procedure to ban the purchasing of agricultural products under production costs, adding the practice to the black-list of the UTP directive. Prices paid to farmers have to cover the costs of producing what they sell, as well as a decent salary and social contributions and protection for them and all agricultural workers. This targeted amendment of the UTP directive should focus not on changing the directive text but rather on updating the UTP black list via a fast-track, urgent procedure.

The EU Commission should not delay such action; it is an urgent matter of social justice, and waiting for the evaluation of the directive to be finished before taking action is an unnecessary delay.

There is an urgent need to change the directive now, and work on the topic of prices must be continued more broadly as part of the revision of the CMO regulation. ECVC welcomes the current proposal to modify the CMO law, but advocates to integrate measures in the revision to avoid overproduction and adjust the volumes to enable the reterritorialization of agriculture, better manage crises, reduce the negative consequences of monopolies in the food chain and regulate imports to stop unfair global competition from which farmers and rural workers are the first to suffer [3].

The EU Commission must take this opportunity to show it is acting in the interests of all EU farmers.