Denmark’s dilemma – how to balance farming and environment.
Denmark has come to an arrangement between stakeholders to manage its agri-food transition. It’s called the Green Tripartite Agreement (GTA). In times of protest and regulatory rollback, this seems like progress.
So is it? What’s in this agreement – and what’s not? Where are the gaps, where are the signs of progress? And is it a model for elsewhere?
Here at ARC, we will run a series of think-pieces on this new agreement in Denmark and what the implications are. We will also host a discussion in Brussels, to bring stakeholders together.
Denmark
Denmark is an agri-food powerhouse, producing efficiently for export but suffering under various environment stresses as many European member states are.
The Danish agri-food model is highly industrialised, with both land concentration and high levels of debt increasingly defining the terrain.
Indeed Denmark already has a quite industrialised and somewhat urbanised countryside, with green tech very visible on the landscape and off-farm jobs significantly supplementing farm incomes, to the point of delaying internal convergence (direct payment equalisations under CAP).
Change
To come to this GTA, government parties plus the Danish Agriculture and Food Council, Denmark’s Nature Conservation Association, Food Federation NNF, Danish Metal, Danish Industry and the National Association of Municipalities signed off on this on June 24th.
Even in coming to this agreement, and in the aftermath, there are increasingly animated discussions in Denmark about inclusion and exclusion, about governance, about implementation and implications.
Indeed the whole thing is still winding it way through Parliament as implementation and final sign-off haven’t come yet – despite the globe trotting tours by Danish Ministers lauding the GTA as best in the world.
So what’s in the GTA, and what’s not? How will land use and agri-food production change? Have farmers actually agreed to a livestock tax? Is it really the case that 390,000 hectares of land is being taken out of production? If so, what is the land use change proposed, and what are the implications of this?
How will different environmental needs (e.g. renewables, nature restoration) co-exist in this changing space? What about farmers’ investments, and those hard-to-fix emissions from agriculture? Does the GTA see change in what will be produced – e.g. livestock products – or is this off the table? Will the GTA push appropriate technology or silver bullets?
What of the people who currently dwell in rural areas? Who is implementing this agreement, and do they have the financial support, the capabilities and the capacity to do so?
And, after all this, is this whole approach actually ambitious enough on climate and pollutants, is it blind to biodiversity, and overly reliant on troubling technologies and magic trees?
So many questions to provoke – let’s find some answers.
We will hear from a range of people on this Danish dilemma – on balancing agri-food, climate, nature, renewables, technology, rural interests and more. Let’s see how these competing, sometimes contradictory, sometimes complementary interests unfold.
If you would like to participate, email oliver@arc2020.eu
With support from Heinrich Böll Stiftung Brussels.
