Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2007-10-23-Speech-2-358"
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"en.20071023.26.2-358"2
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"Mr President, as I said last month during the debate we had in Parliament on the suspension of compulsory set-aside, which was also a night sitting, the increase in agricultural prices should provoke an in-depth discussion on the direction that the common agricultural policy is taking.
We will soon have the Communication from the European Commission on the CAP ‘health check’ on the table, but I fear that in that communication the Community executive will not be bold enough to acknowledge that the liberalisation of the markets also has a price, and that European farmers and consumers are now starting to pay that price.
Many Members of this House have always favoured a dismantling of the market management measures and have contributed to projecting the negative image that European consumers have built up regarding the CAP.
As I said at the last plenary sitting, I would like to know how we are now going to explain to citizens that we scarcely have the instruments to control these rises in agricultural prices in the European Union.
It would also be interesting to ask the European Commission to estimate what the cost is going to be for European citizens of this increase in food prices and to compare this cost with the cost for each citizen of the common agricultural policy.
I would also really like to know whether or not citizens will ultimately benefit in the coming years from the liberalisation of the markets and the drastic cuts in direct aid that European farmers are suffering from.
I am going to give you a statistic which I think is very significant: before the creation of the CAP, in 1961, the prices of raw materials for producing animal feed were twice as high as the prices paid by farmers 20 years later. The common agricultural policy guaranteed a supply of raw materials at an affordable price and at the same time European consumers also benefited from a fair price for an essential commodity.
In a country such as mine, Spain, we are seeing rises in prices of foods as basic as milk. I think that the economics and finance ministers of the European governments should now also be more concerned about the repercussions that this increase will have on inflation in their countries."@en1
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