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EU agriculture chief Janusz Wojciechowski has promised to do his finest to put carbon farming entrance and centre of member states’ Common agriculture coverage (CAP) strategic plans amid considerations that good phrases is not going to translate into motion.
Highlighting that carbon farming is a key precedence of the French presidency, the Commissioner confused its significance for European farming’s future throughout a gathering of Parliament’s agriculture committee (AGRI) on Monday (10 January).
“We need to work together to increase this direction of development of European agriculture,” he mentioned, calling it a “good opportunity” for farmers to have further supply income sooner or later.
Carbon farming – a brand new buzzword in agriculture – goals to extend the quantity of carbon dioxide (CO2) saved within the soil, lowering its presence within the ambiance.
This is achieved utilizing numerous agricultural strategies starting from crop rotation, cowl crops, and decreased tillage to precision nitrogen utility.
There is at the moment no focused coverage instrument to considerably incentivise carbon removals and the safety of carbon shares.
To tackle this, the European Commission’s new communication on sustainable carbon cycles, printed again in December, units out actions to assist carbon farming and upscale the enterprise mannequin to reward land managers for carbon sequestration and biodiversity safety.
The Commission will even suggest an EU regulatory framework for the certification of carbon removals by the tip of 2022.
But the communication obtained a lukewarm response from the farming sector, whereas NGOs blasted it for letting actual polluters off the hook.
While MEPs welcomed the Commissioner’s sturdy concentrate on carbon farming, a quantity took to the ground to push on how this may translate in follow.
For instance, leftist MEP Luke ‘Ming’ Flanagan requested whether or not the Commissioner would think about making carbon farming a devoted measure within the CAP strategic plans.
Through these plans, EU nations will set out how they intend to fulfill the 9 EU-wide aims of the CAP reform whereas on the identical time responding to the wants of their farmers and rural communities.
Meanwhile, fellow Irish MEP Colm Markey queried whether or not the Commission would think about a separate revenue stream or construction particularly for carbon farming to make sure that farmers are usually not left in a scenario the place they’re obliged to do extra work for a similar cash.
His considerations echo that of Pekka Pesonen, general-secretary of EU farmers’ affiliation COPA-COGECA, who instructed EURACTIV again in November that whereas the Commission’s initiatives on carbon removals may turn into a further supply of revenue for farmers, it may “easily become a financial and administrative burden for them”.
This runs the danger of accelerating their prices, lowering their productiveness, and decreasing their incomes, he warned on the time.
In response, the Commissioner promised to “endeavour to ensure that carbon farming, to an extent as large as possible, will be incorporated in [CAP] strategic plans.” However, he conceded that it presents a problem.
He added assurances that the EU “will not have a situation where farmers will have to do more for the same money” however that as an alternative insisted there’s “a chance that the situation will be the opposite”.
“Farmers will be rewarded for good practices for which they have not been rewarded so far,” he mentioned, promising that there might be approach for an “alternative to industrial farming”.
[Edited by Alice Taylor]
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