Examination of Witnesses (Questions 520
- 536)
WEDNESDAY 5 DECEMBER 2007
Mr Yves Madre
Q520 Chairman:
It does not fit the Napoleon tradition, does it?
Mr Madre: I think from the figures it is quite
clear what we are focusing on in France considering the second
pillar. The second point is in the European Union we have a regional
policy and we hope that what concerns the regional policy will
be under the regional policy and not under the CAP and what concerns
Pillar II CAP will be financed by CAP funds. We have several policies
in the European Union and we to have use them in the best possible
way. We are not keen on financing with the CAP things that should
be financed by the regional policy. The last point is modulation.
Modulation, according to us, should only be a tool, but sometimes
I wonder if modulation is not an aim for some people. When you
define a tool you must know what its purpose is. I was in an eastern
country Member State some days ago and the conclusion of the scientists
was, "Considering the Commission's proposals we will have
13% of modulation plus 12% of capping, so that means 25% and that
is fine. We could be in favour." The last comment was, "What
will we do with this money?" and after they had no idea and
that is the problem. If ever anybody suggests having more modulation,
the good purposes should be defined. This is the same thing when
we speak about the future of the CAP. First, we would like to
define the policies and after the budget, the financial needs,
not the other way around.
Q521 Viscount Ullswater:
I think you mentioned in your first answer the regional policies
that you have in France and the Pillar II policies. Do they marry
up correctly or are you concerned that one is trying to cover
something which should be done by regional policies and using
the CAP finance to do it?
Mr Madre: Today I would say it is not so bad
but regional policy could do better. Tomorrow we have to use both
of them. We are just speaking about CAP and the fact that CAP
within the second pillar should do a lot, and that is fair enough,
but the CAP should do what the CAP is defined for. I think that
in some cases we have to use the regional policy and regional
funds, for instance regional funds could be used in order to increase
non-agricultural activities in some remote areas, not only CAP.
Q522 Viscount Ullswater:
So it is the social policy as well as an agricultural policy that
need to work in conjunction.
Mr Madre: CAP is an agricultural policy.
Q523 Viscount Ullswater:
Bur regional can be social?
Mr Madre: Regional can be to develop regional
activities and if that is the meaning of social, why not?
Q524 Chairman:
You would have to have a fairly radical reform of regional funds
though, would you not?
Mr Madre: Regional policy has to be defined
for the future.
Chairman: How eloquent.
Q525 Lord Greaves:
Are you talking about European regional policy or French regional
policy?
Mr Madre: European policy. Concerning the French
regional policy, that has to be defined for the future as well.
Q526 Earl of Dundee:
Within new EU Member States agriculture is a major contributor
to employment, to the economy and much structural change is called
for as a result of that. What impact do you think that structural
change will have on the Common Agricultural Policy? Will it simply
increase its budget or will it cause the CAP's purpose to be revised?
Mr Madre: We are not dreaming about some increase
of the CAP budget. I say that considering the Health Check and
the future of the CAP. We want to be realistic, open-minded and
we have no trouble changing. We are used to seeing it differently,
but it is a question of how people see French people, of course.
We do suggest discussing the future of the CAP because things
are changing and the structure of the European farm industry is
changing despite the fact that it remains mainly family farms.
The fact is the CAP is quite alive. From the beginning it has
changed successfully quite a lot of times and the CAP from 2003
has nothing to do with the CAP at the beginning or in the 1990s.
Just because we define other objectives it has to be underlined
that the different CAPs' aims each time were asking for more food
for Europe and the farmers, thanks to the CAP, produced more food.
When we said we had to be in the world market, they did it. When
we said we had to avoid surprises, today there are no more surprises.
Tomorrow we have to meet other goals, other aims. This is why
we think we need to discuss the future of the CAP as to what will
be the next European agricultural policy. It will be a strong
one but aimed at remote areas and a contribution from the good
and agricultural industry to the European industry and the fact
that the agriculture and food industry is part of the global industry
and so should play its part in the Lisbon Agenda. Everything is
on the table.
Q527 Lord Greaves:
Could I perhaps act as devil's advocate here. Discussing things
is one thing and putting things on the table, but France has a
long way to go to persuade the rest of us that really your agenda
is not to slow down reform as much as possible and to stop as
much of it as possible because France is a great beneficiary of
the system as it stands at the moment and has been seen as, perhaps,
the leading country in opposing reform. Is that really changing?
Mr Madre: France is agreeing to speed up reforms.
After Mr Sarkozy's speech we felt that the general feeling and
general fear maybe was what is France doing to speed up and that
is strange. The fact is France is acting, and will act, like its
President so we are ready to speak about everything as long as
it is in the right order, so first policy and then budget. The
consequences of what we choose altogether as a European agricultural
policy on the budget we will not try to escape and that is very
clear. All the subjects concerning policy will be on the table.
We will put some papers on the table, not before March but at
least for September 2008 and we wish to have a very open discussion
at European level. If the result of the discussion is that we
have to define what is the future very quickly, why not? If the
general meaning is the European Union should take time then we
will consider that.
Q528 Lord Greaves:
If France is not going to be the state holding it all back now,
which ones are?
Mr Madre: We are not trying to sit on a golden
vote. The next CAP should be a policy of projects, not the policy
of the past.
Q529 Earl of Dundee:
I wonder if I could connect Lord Greaves' point to my earlier
question on enlargement. As Lord Greaves said, some self-interest
in France or in the United Kingdom may have held up, or may hold
up, the process of reforming the CAP. If you think of the impact
of enlargement as something which is a catalyst it may be an ally.
I wonder if you believe that or, in other words, if you think
that in spite of what we will all do or will fail to do on our
volition to do with CAP reform the impact of enlargement will
force it through. Do you believe that?
Mr Madre: We know what the impact of enlargement
will be and we knew it in 2002 when we had this initial agreement.
The fact is that the impact of enlargement from now to 2013 will
be less important than we thought in 2002 because of the prices,
because of what we can see in the European agricultural budget.
The impact of enlargement on the agricultural budget will be a
matter for mainly after 2013. Today we do receive some benefit
from the CAP but we are a net contributor, quite a high one. Tomorrow
we will continue to be a net contributor and we are happy to be
so because it is the European Union and it is about solidarity.
We will not be a net beneficiary from the CAP any more and, despite
that, we do think we will need a European common policy on agriculture.
It is not all about money in the budget and what we can gain or
not, it is more than that, it is a question of Europe, of having
common policies not only on the market without any common idea
of what should be the aim and what we should do. Of course enlargement
should be considered and the consequences of enlargement have
been considered, but it is not because of enlargement that we
say we have to redefine the CAP for some financial purpose, it
is more because of the evolution of the open markets and the evolution
of farms and evolution of society and what society are asking
on the environment, on landscapes and because of the WTO as well.
One day we will have a deal in Geneva and we will have to consider
all of the consequences of that deal. We will speak of that first
and enlargement is just another point we will have to consider.
We know that we will get far less money.
Q530 Chairman:
You have drawn our attention to what President Sarkozy has been
saying and he is by far and away one of the most interesting politicians
in Europe at the moment and saying some very challenging things.
The difficulty is when we have this new thinking coming from Sarkozy
on the one hand and then up pops the idea of Community preference.
That gives to some people the idea that is really just trying
to replace formal import tariff barriers with non-tariff barriers
and it is back to a semi-protectionist view of European agriculture.
Mr Madre: Do you think so?
Q531 Chairman:
Oh, yes. It has the potential.
Mr Madre: Very nice. It is not Community preference
but just another way to say it is fair. The Government of the
Netherlands some weeks or months ago said trade concerns have
to be considered when we discuss the WTO but today they are not
on the agenda, that is for tomorrow. It is a question of us being
fair and if we want very strict rules on our farmers on what they
produce in the European Union I have some difficulty understanding
why we should allow anything to be imported within the European
Union. Secondly, it is a question of food safety. We need to be
sure that what is imported and what will be imported is safe.
It is safe and fair, not trying to find some other rules, unwritten
rules, to avoid imports of American cereals or cereals from Belarussia
or something like that. If it is safe and everybody has the same
rules there are no problems.
Chairman: You know those words could
be said almost word-for-word by John Edwards, the most protectionist
candidate for the Democratic nomination.
Q532 Lord Plumb:
How does your statement fit into the WTO rules? This would be
a fairly major problem. I can see your point on fairness. If you
think of the vast amount of chickens imported from China, Brazil
and a lot of places where the standards of welfare are not the
same as they are in Europe then I can understand it but WTO has
to have some responsibility for making sure that they comply with
those standards and, as I understand it, they are moving more
in that direction now. Is that not a factor and a major factor
in deciding this thinking?
Mr Madre: We will see over the next year that
this topic will be very high on the agenda because of the environment
and standards of living, food safety. It is just the beginning.
When I listen to other countries that are quite liberal free trade
countries, a lot of them are considering the topic. It is for
the future and we have a lot to discuss with them.
Q533 Chairman:
We have got a question on climate change but it is such a big
topic, the relationship between agriculture and climate change,
if you do not mind, if you could write to us on that it would
be helpful because we are virtually at the end of our time.
Mr Madre: I appreciate that because I have to
catch a train for Paris to prepare for the Presidency.
Q534 Lord Cameron of Dillington:
You talked about food security and security policy and listening
to you throughout this morning I get the impression that France
is still as protectionist as ever about its agriculture industry
and there has been very little change. Do you ever see the day,
particularly when world food shortages seem to be coming, that
you will be prepared to let your agriculture industry be like
any other industry and have the risks of an entrepreneurial capitalist
system and not be protected at all? Do you ever see that happening
in French policy?
Mr Madre: Do you think that the European agricultural
sector is a very protected one?
Q535 Lord Cameron of Dillington:
Yes.
Mr Madre: I do not think so. They have some
direct payments, but—
Lord Cameron of Dillington: It is 43%
of the European budget. Huge amounts of money come from the state
to industry, it does not go into any other industry, and why should
it, they fare in the market. We have not got the time to discuss
this.
Q536 Chairman:
I think you have opened up a can of worms.
Mr Madre: We have a European agricultural policy
with some funding, we do not have any other policies, for instance
for research. If Member States decide tomorrow to have a common
research policy we have no more budget and it will be much higher
than for agriculture. Concerning protection or not of agriculture,
we are quite happy to hear that markets should lead the decision
and tomorrow that will be the case even more than today, and that
is quite normal. Agriculture is quite different from, let us say,
the automotive industry. I cannot succeed in taking my land and
putting my land in Brazil, it is still in Brittany and that is
a fact. You cannot decide just like that to go away with your
land, with your farm, as you can in other industries. Agriculture
is not only agricultural goods, it is a matter of the environment,
landscapes, society, and we will never succeed in applying exactly
the same rules.
Chairman: Thank you very much. I think
it is a great triumph and a sign of major advance that we have
got through this session without any reference to the European
model of agriculture. Thank you very much indeed. It has been
a great performance, absolutely wonderful. Thank you.
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