Biodiversity Archives - Page 4 of 8 - Agricultural and Rural Convention

CAP, Interrupted – So Withdraw the CAP!

December 3, 2020 Oliver Moore

As trilogues to decide the future of CAP progress behind closed doors, the business-as-usual lobby is fighting its corner with some level of exacerbation. They are annoyed with the Commission, with the scientific community, and with young people in the decision-making corridors. Fridays for Future and a host of civil society stakeholders want the Commission to Withdraw the CAP, and the case for doing just this is mounting, as the chasm between the European Green Deal and CAP widens. […]

MFF – Increased EU Budget for Biodiversity and More

November 11, 2020 Alison Brogan

Biodiversity, organic farming, young farmers and other areas received a welcome financial boost from the EU institutions on Tuesday (10th November). The European Parliament’s negotiating team and the German Presidency of the Council reached agreement on the forthcoming Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF), the EU’s budget for 2021 – 2027. […]

CAP Reform | Postcards From The Future

November 4, 2020 Hannes Lorenzen

The European Commission has initiated the process of building a vision for rural Europe for 2040. But to be genuinely valuable, a visioning exercise should look no further than the near future. ARC2020 president Hannes Lorenzen envisions the next seven years, looking ahead to 2027 before bringing us back to 2021 and the present day. […]

Reclaiming the Place of Agrobiodiversity in the Conservation and Food Debates

October 12, 2020 ARC

Both academic and policy debates tend to focus on how to further intensify agricultural landscapes to spare natural lands for natural biodiversity conservation and carbon sequestration. This Brief from IDDRI elaborates on a literature review of recent publications to argue that equal attention should be paid to the protection and restoration of biodiversity within agricultural landscapes, most notably for the role it plays as a critical production factor. […]

New Seed Platform – Seeds4All – Launches

October 5, 2020 ARC

Seeds4All is dedicated to seed diversity, and it aims to “give visibility to all European organisations that collect, enrich, produce, disseminate and sustainably use traditional and new varieties of seeds belonging to the public domain, freely reproducible and not genetically modified.” […]

Insect Atlas: Europe’s Killing Fields

September 21, 2020 ARC

In Europe’s killing fields, the biggest driver of insect decline is monoculture-dominated and pesticide-reliant industrial agriculture. The EU should channel the billions it spends on CAP to support climate- and insect-friendly farming practices, argue Sandra Bell, Barbara Unmüßig and Jagoda Munić. […]

CAP | Kloeckner Launches Direct Attack on GAEC 9, Eco-Schemes and Green Deal

September 8, 2020 ARC

The German presidency of the EU has made some severe proposals to neuter environmental aspects of the upcoming CAP plan. German Agriculture Minister Julia Kloeckner has proposed weakening areas dedicated to nature, taking money from eco-schemes, and potentially protecting CAP from the EU Commission’s flagship EU Green Deal. […]

EU Subsidies Benefit Big Farms While Underfunding Greener and Poorer Plots – New Research

September 3, 2020 ARC

With big farms gobbling up nearly half of the CAP pie, direct payments are exacerbating income inequality among farmers – whilst fuelling the destruction of the very environment upon which farming depends, finds a new study by Murray Scown, Kimberly Nicholas and Mark Brady. […]

CAP | EU Failing Its Ailing Wild Pollinators, Say Auditors

July 13, 2020 Louise Kelleher

Pollinators secure our food supply, but Europe’s wild pollinators are being wiped out by intensive agriculture and the use of pesticides and fertilisers. In the latest in a series of damning reports, the European Court of Auditors accuses the Commission of failing ailing pollinator populations. Louise Kelleher reports. […]

EU Green Deal | Carbon Farming Not Compatible With Agroecology

June 16, 2020 ARC

The agriculture section of the EU Green Deal is plagued with contradictions. On the plus side, it finally acknowledges the need to massively develop agroecology. But Farm to Fork advocates for a range of false solutions, including so-called “carbon farming”. All agricultural models cannot coexist, argue Manon Castagné and François Delvaux in this op-ed. […]

Species Extinction & the Case for a Global Moratorium on Gene Drives

June 14, 2020 ARC

Stop Gene Drives is a campaign to prevent future releases of gene drive organisms into the environment in Germany, Europe and worldwide. In this op-ed, Head of Campaign Mareike Imken makes the case for a global moratorium on the release of gene drive organisms – before it is too late. […]

CAP and Biodiversity | Wake-Up Call For Green Deal Commission?

June 12, 2020 Louise Kelleher

Last week’s damning report on CAP and biodiversity was a wake-up call. But will the Green Deal Commission go back to sleep? The European Court of Auditors insists CAP must deliver more in the 2030 biodiversity strategy. Civil society organizations are now watching closely to see the Commission doesn’t hit snooze and sink back into business as usual. Louise Kelleher takes us through the reactions. […]

European Green Deal | Revving Up For CAP Reform, Or More Hot Air?

June 11, 2020 Matteo Metta

The European Green Deal has the potential to shape the CAP towards a more sustainable and environmentally friendly policy. But as we’ve seen with the debate surrounding the Farm to Fork and Biodiversity strategies published last month, it can also distract attention from the less obvious problems of the CAP. Analysis by Matteo Metta. […]

Ammonia | Hanging Around Like A Bad Smell

June 10, 2020 Alison Brogan

An unpleasant stench stank out cities across Europe this spring as the pandemic-induced drop in emissions from transport and industry cleared the air for agricultural air pollution. As luck would have it, the Covid-19 lockdowns coincided with peak slurry-spreading time – making the stink all the more pungent. But there’s more to manure than a bad smell to worry about. Alison Brogan reports. […]

CAP | Billions Spent on Biodiversity with Little Impact – Auditors

June 7, 2020 Louise Kelleher

The EU has funnelled €66 billion into farmland biodiversity since 2014 – and has little to show for it. That’s the conclusion of a special report released on Friday by the European Court of Auditors. The auditors slammed the half-baked targets of the EU 2020 biodiversity strategy, its odd-couple relationship with CAP, lack of monitoring, and some very un-smart spending by the European Commission. A series of recommendations have been made. Louise Kelleher reports. […]