New Minister in charge of Council CAP negotiations

January 11, 2013 Oliver Moore Latest from Brussels, Latest from EU Member States, Main stories

The EU roadshow descended upon Dublin this week, as Ireland’s six month presidency of the Council of the European Union began in earnest. European Council President Herman Van Rompuy as well as the College of Commissioners, led by Commission President José Manuel Barroso, all arrived in Dublin Castle to discuss the Presidency programme.

Photo credit European Union — Coveney and Barrosso. Photo credit: European Union

Priorities for the Irish presidency are “stability, growth and jobs”, though managing the CAP negotiations, due to conclude by the end of the Irish presidency in June, is also crucial. To maintain this timeline, EU and CAP budgets will need to be agreed within two months, while the European Council of Ministers and the EU Parliament will need to first establish their own positions and then reach an agreement.

The Irish Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine is headed by the youthful and energetic Minister Simon Coveney, holder of a BSc in Agriculture and Land Management, who will chair key CAP negotiations between EU Ministers. Coveney, tipped as a possible future leader of the largest party in government, Fine Gael, has been on a sometimes controversial globe trotting mission to grow exports for the Irish agri-food sector.

He has been gung-ho in helping to develop export markets, especially for the Irish dairy sector, which is earmarked to grow by 50% by 2020. Coveney described the opening of a dairy processing factory in 2012 by Kerry Group, Ireland’s largest agri-food company, as “phenomenal” and “perhaps the most significant investment ever in the Irish Agri Food industry”. He also embarked on what he described as the largest ever Irish trade emission, to China last year , a country seen as having massive potential to grow Irish exports.

Irish food and drink exports are 28% higher now than in 2009, and have passed the 9billion Euro mark. Crucially, the agri-food sector accounts for 1/3 of all net foreign earnings – that’s revenue from abroad that comes onto the island. This differs radically from other growth areas, such as the tax shy ICT and also the pharmaceuticals sectors.

So the stakes are certainly high, and the focus for Coveney and his political party Fine Gael is, and has always been, increasing productivity in all agri-food sectors, especially beef and dairy. Fine Gael are seen as representing the interests of the bigger, wealthier farmers in the parts of Ireland with the best land. Dairy farmers are, by a considerable distance, the wealthiest sector in Irish farming, with family farm incomes approaching E70,000.

Balancing Ireland’s clean green image with spearheading a massive drive towards increasing milk and meat production will be difficult for the Irish government: already agri-food makes up about 1/3 of Ireland’s Green House Gas emissions, with no signs of any significant reduction in the near future.

And balancing national interests with the more neutral role of chairing the EU Council of Agriculture Ministers will also be a challenge for the Minister who has come a long way since being expelled from a private school as a hard-partying teenager.

About Oliver Moore 214 Articles

Dr. Oliver Moore is the communications director and editor-in-chief with ARC2020. He has a PhD in the sociology of farming and food, where he specialised in organics and direct sales. He is published in the International Journal of Consumer Studies, International Journal of Agricultural Resources, Governance and Ecology and the Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development. A weekly columnist and contributor with Irish Examiner, he is a regular on Countrywide (Irish farm radio show on the national broadcaster RTE 1) and engages in other communications work around agri-food and rural issues, such as with the soil, permaculture, climate change adaptation and citizen science initiative Grow Observatory . He lectures part time in the Centre for Co-operative Studies UCC.

A propos d'Oliver Moore
Oliver voyage beaucoup moins qu’auparavant, pour ce qui concerne son activité professionnelle. Il peut néanmoins admirer par la fenêtre de son bureau les mésanges charbonnières et les corbeaux perchés au sommet du saule dans le jardin de sa maison au cœur de l’écovillage de Cloughjordan, en Irlande. L’écovillage est un site de 67 acres dans le nord du Tipperary. Il comprend d’espaces boisés, des paysages comestibles, des lieux de vie, d’habitation et de travail, ainsi qu’une ferme appartenant à la communauté. Les jours où il travaille dans le bureau du centre d’entreprise communautaire, il profite d’une vue sur les chevaux, les panneaux solaires, les toilettes sèches et les jardins familiaux.

Ce bureau au sein de l’écovillage constitue en effet un tiers-lieu de travail accueillant également des collaborateurs des associations Cultivate et Ecolise, ainsi qu’un laboratoire de fabrication (« fab lab »).

Oliver est membre du conseil d’administration de la ferme communautaire (pour la seconde fois !) et donne également des cours sur le Master en coopératives, agroalimentaire et développement durable à l’University College Cork. Il a une formation en sociologie rurale : son doctorat et les articles qu’il publie dans des journaux scientifiques portent sur ce domaine au sens large.

Il consacre la majorité de son temps de travail à l’ARC 2020. Il collabore avec ARC depuis 2013, date à laquelle l’Irlande a assuré la présidence de l’UE pendant six mois. C’est là qu’il a pu constater l’importance de la politique agroalimentaire et rurale grâce à sa chronique hebdomadaire sur le site d’ARC. Après six mois, il est nommé rédacteur en chef et responsable de la communication, poste qu’il occupe toujours aujourd’hui. Oliver supervise le contenu du site web et des médias sociaux, aide à définir l’orientation de l’organisation et parfois même rédige un article pour le site web.

À l’époque où on voyageait davantage, il a eu la chance de passer du temps sous les tropiques, où il a aidé des ONG irlandaises de commerce équitable – au Ghana, au Kenya, au Mali, en Inde et au Salvador – à raconter leur histoire.

Il se peut que ces jours-là reviennent. Pour son compte Oliver continuera de préférer naviguer en Europe par bateau, puis en train. Après tout, la France n’est qu’à une nuit de navigation. En attendant, il y a toujours de nombreuses possibilités de bénévolat dans la communauté dans les campagnes du centre de l’Irlande.