EU Commission backpedals on pesticide directive
EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen is withdrawing the planned regulation on the sustainable use of pesticides (SUR). She made the announcement on Tuesday when presenting the EU's climate policy goals to the EU Parliament. Europe's press analyses the decision in the context of the farmers' protests and the European elections in June.
Look closely and come up with suitable responses
Before concessions are made to the farmers the motives behind the protests should be more carefully analysed, El Periódico de Catalunya demands:
“Beyond structural reasons there are also emotional ones. ... And not all of them are the result of a political instrumentalisation which, as is clear in the case of the European and Spanish far right, is trying to turn the countryside into the armed wing of climate change deniers. ... What is worrying is the fact that the only response to the farmers' demands has been to relax environmental policies, as with the the EU's renunciation of the reduction of plant protection products. These are, lamentably, the issues which can be most easily used in election campaigns. There should be other, far more substantial responses.”
No campaign gifts please!
It's unfortunate that decisions on such a sensitive issue are being influenced by electoral manoeuvres, republica.ro laments:
“The political elite in Brussels must realise that European policies for the future cannot be discussed or regulated just a few months before the elections, because the risk of politicisation is extremely high. Commission President Ursula von der Leyen's step backwards on environmental policy is part of a broader scaling back of the EU Commission's environmental policy ambitions in a bid to appease farmers. After all, they are an important group of voters for the centre-right EPP group to which the Commission President belongs and which wants to remain the strongest group in the EU Parliament after this summer's elections.”
Clumsy attempts at vote-catching
Now everyone is competing for the farmers' votes, La Stampa complains:
“Ursula von der Leyen first announced another extension of the suspension of the four percent fallow obligation as part of the new CAP plans to promote biodiversity. This was followed by the withdrawal of the proposal for a regulation on pesticides. The reasons von der Leyen gave for these revisions risk of being seen as signs that European institutions are easy to bully. ... The fact that the President of the European Commission is already on the campaign trail exposes her to the criticism that she is clumsily courting the voters of the agricultural sector and lagging behind other political actors who had already taken up the farmers' cause.”
Not the first capitulation
The comprehensive Farm 2 Fork Strategy presented by the EU Commission in 2020 is being watered down regulation by regulation, laments the web portal Crisis Monitor:
“Under pressure from conservatives and lobbyists, the strategy has been gradually weakened and reduced to the bare minimum. Last year, the Commission decided to abandon the 'Sustainable Food Act', which was supposed to form the backbone of the EU's flagship food policy. ... Other planned and controversial agricultural legislation - such as new rules on animal welfare in agriculture and Europe-wide nutritional labelling of food - was ultimately not put forward by von der Leyen's team.”
An important building block now lacking
The EU Commission's backtracking is damaging to the environment, criticises Der Standard:
“The planned regulation on the sustainable use of pesticides (SUR) is an important building block in the Green Deal. The use of agricultural poisons is to be halved by 2030. Pesticides kill pests, but they also harm the environment and human health, so we need to use fewer of them. ... The Commission delivered - and came to the conclusion that a restriction would neither jeopardise food security nor would make the costs for agriculture prohibitive. Now the decision is being put on the back burner. This will not take the pressure off farmers to become greener.”