Loading ...‘If I am validated as Commissioner, I shall take measures to consolidate the CAP. I am well aware of the fact that the diversity of agriculture and rural areas in the European Union is properly represented here, in this committee. I want to preserve this diversity,’ Ciolos said in his 10-minute introductory speech delivered in Romanian.
Dacian Ciolos added that the CAP must benefit from an appropriate budget in line with the European Union’s ambitions and objectives. He pointed out that the direct payments in agriculture had proved their viability so far and were essential. ‘We will have to place them on new, realistic bases. More equity is needed when distributing these payments,’ the Commissioner Designate explained.
“The CAP has continuously adapted to the domestic needs and progress, but also to international developments. Nothing of what we have got till today is an asset granted for ever. Agriculture is no longer only a producer of food, but also of public goods,” Ciolos said in his speech.
The Commissioner Designate said that European farmers wanted predictability and stability, consumers wanted good products and tax payers wanted their money to be spent efficiently.
He also said that the future CAP must go on being a robust and balanced European policy, based on three components: I think that direct payments have proved their viability and have a part to play in maintaining the stability of farmers’ incomes. “We will have to see the way and criteria according to which they are distributed and place them on realistic bases,” added Ciolos, who remarked that a better equity among farmers was needed.
Dacian Ciolos thinks that the market must go on playing a regulating part as the EU cannot afford to go through crises affecting whole sectors of the food industry in vulnerable regions.
He said that the market regulating mechanisms must contribute to the CAP aims and correct the deficiencies of the market by rapidly and flexibly answering its variations. “The volatility of the prices of food in the past few years has shown that we must get new and adapted solutions. I am sure that we shall find them together,” said Ciolos in his introductory speech.
The rural development policy must continue with the development of the farming sector and adapt to climate changes, said Ciolos. “It will have to turn to better account the diversity of European agricultures, to promote the public-private partnership and we must do it in close cooperation with the cohesion policy. When speaking of the CAP, we do not only speak of our food, of what we place on the table, we also speak of a few million jobs,” insisted the European Commissioner.
Secondly Ciolos made it clear that the rural development policy, which will have to stay as part of the CAP, will have to turn to better account the diversity of European agriculture and it must be in close connection with the cohesion policy. Once the Treaty of Lisbon enters into force, the family of farmers is consolidated and I want to assure you that I will consolidate this reality if you validate me to this position, also said Ciolos.
“I come from a country which was through a collectivization, through a revolution and then found its road in Europe. Besides by convictions related to freedom and fundamental values, my interest in the European construction has developed in close connection with my interest in the rural development. I have learnt that nobody can understand agriculture by sitting in an office, he or she can understand it by means of a real dialogue with farmers,” also said Ciolos.
A 2-hour and 40-minute session of questions and answers will follow this 10-minute introductory speech. Each member of the European Parliament to take the floor will have 1 minute available for asking a question and the Commissioner is granted 2 minutes to answer. For each additional question asked by the same person, Dacian Ciolos may answer in 1 minute.
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