
Contributors
Interested in European food, farming and rural policy matters? Do you have great writing skills and an ability to deliver content accurately and on time? Then you could be just what weâre looking for! Find out more here.
Interested in European food, farming and rural policy matters? Do you have great writing skills and an ability to deliver content accurately and on time? Then you could be just what weâre looking for! Find out more here.
A vote in the European Parliament this coming Wednesday 14th June will be crucial in deciding whether pesticides will be banned from Ecological Focus Areas (EFAs). It is a simple majority vote by MEPs, and it is likely to be tight. Here we outline what you can do, make the case for keeping pesticides out of EFAs, and myth bust some common misconceptions on pesticides and EFAs. […]
Catch crops (68%), fallow land (16.2%) and nitrogen fixing crops (11.8%) dominated ecological focus areas (EFAs) in Germany in 2015. Why is this? What influences farmersâ decisions on EFAs? One of the authors of a new peer reviewed publication on this topic, ARC2020 regular Sebastian Lackner, summarises the paper, in which he and colleagues interviewed a range of experts on the matter. […]
An upcoming EU seminar on the potential for results-based agri-environment schemes â or High Nature Value farmland – is happening Thursday, 30th March. In advance, Dolores Byrne outlines the case for HNVf.
Wrapping up this third curated debate, we in ARC2020 begin to draw elements of a road map for how the Common Agricultural Policy could evolve. The timing is perfect – the European Commission has recently launched a consultation on modernisation and simplification of the CAP. Let’s use this #AfterCAP debate as a springboard to delve deeper into Europe’s agri-food and rural policies. […]
After the âWe Are Fed Up!” demonstration is before the action! At the Soup&Talk event Farmers, organisers and activists from Germany, Europe and overseas reported on their campaigns, successes, their resistance and innovations in food and farming. […]
Sebastian Lakner finds fault with the recent COPA contribution to our #AfterCAP debate in terms of market policies, red tape and public goods. He presents his suggestions. […]
Sebastian Lanker and Rainer Oppermann explain how CAP is failing environmentally, before outlining specific budget neutral proposals, including for sustainability and agri-nature payments. […]
New data from Lower Saxony on the registration of ecological focus area (EFA) for 2016 are published. The data shows almost no changes: The EFA is still an expensive measure for taxpayers with little positive impact on biodiversity. Sebastian Lanker gives ARC2020 this exclusive on the topic. […]
âEcological focus areas should be established, in particular, in order to safeguard and improve biodiversity on farmsâ. So say the official EU documents. And yet for these EFAs, Member States are choosing âproductive optionsâ – in particular catch crops and nitrogen fixing crops – over biodiversity. Using newly released data, Sebastian Lakner shows us just how ineffective and poorly targeted EFAs are, in Germany and beyond. […]
Analysis from German finds that Ecological Focus Areas – a core part of the ‘greening’ of the Pillar 1 of the CAP – are having little positive impact on biodiversity. Farmers use the full set of options, but with a strong emphasis on the production options. Guest post Sebastian Lanker. […]
What are the different political parties’ positions – in Germany and at EU level – likely to be regarding CAP reform? with Sebastian Lanker. […]
ARC2020’s 2000mÂČ project at the TEDx conference in Berlin: How much arable land do you spend on your food? Watch the TEDx Talk here. […]
Ecological Focus Areas (EFAs) were supposed to be a core part of the greening of CAP: public goods – biodiversity protection – for public money – the citizens tax revenue. However EFAs were watered down to the point of near meaninglessness, we argued here in 2014. In this guest blog post by Sebastian Lakner, the poor biodiversity performance of EFAs in Germany is outlined. […]
An inspiring ‘development’ were 2500 peasants prevented Europe’s largest gold mine. […]
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