8 Amendments of Luke Ming FLANAGAN related to 2016/2024(BUD)
Amendment 1 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 1
Paragraph 1
1. Stresses the importance of agriculture and rural development in delivering many EU objectives and the important part it represents of the overall EU budget for 2017; insists, given its importance, that the agriculture budget remain at least at its current level; points out that spending on agriculture has declined in relative terms since the early days of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) from 75% to the current rate of 38%; further points out as a pan European policy this funding replaces much of the national support for the sector;
Amendment 8 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 2
Paragraph 2
2. Takes note of the cuts in rural development funding under the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development (EAFRD) in terms of commitments and payments for the 2016 budget; highlights that these cuts are detrimental to economic growth in rural areas; points out that the EAFRD, including the LEADER programmes, are a major driver of rural development by giving wider benefits to the EU at large, especially in generating growth and employment in rural areasperipheral areas where the output of traditional agriculture is insufficient to retain populations vital to maintain living communities ; insists that careful consideration be given to the final level of commitments and payments appropriations in the 2017 budget;
Amendment 11 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 3
Paragraph 3
3. Insists that any funds allocated through the financial discipline mechanism to the crisis reserve in the agricultural sector of the 2017 budget that are left unspent be made available in full as direct payments in the following budgetary year; insists that the political decisions taken which led to the Russian embargo does not constitute a crisis which this fund was envisaged to cover and should not be used as a market support tool; requests that all available margins under Heading 2 be reserved for the agriculture sector particularly given the continuing crisis in the milk, pig meat and fruit and vegetable sector and the Russian embargo and significant health risks in the plant and animal sector;
Amendment 17 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 4
Paragraph 4
4. Stresses that additional financial resources are needed for the milk, pig meat and fruit and vegetable sector in order to alleviate any potential impact arising from the crisis or from the Russian embargogiven the direct impact of the Russian embargo, the consequences of which are being carried disproportionally by the agricultural sector and the broader crisis in agricultural commodity markets due to global economic uncertainty; insists further that some specific agricultural sub- sectors are in need of increased funding, e.g. bee keeping; highlights the importance of school milk and school fruit programmes; proposes a small increase in the appropriations for this program in line with Parliament’s objectives;
Amendment 23 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 5
Paragraph 5
5. Insists that sufficient funds be made available in order to implement all elements of the CAP reform, e.g. greening measures, environmental programmes, biodiversity, rural development programmes's; urges the Commission to complete in a timely manner its screening process to identify opportunities for simplification and subsidiarity so that all elements are accessible to farmers with an emphasis on Rural Development measures which have been shown to be more error prone due to their complexity;
Amendment 29 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 6
Paragraph 6
6. Urges the Commission and the Member States to be more active in proposing lasting solutions to combat the significant price volatility of agricultural products; notbelieves that price volatility occurs more frequently in a more globalised market, requiring more effective and rapid actionsthere is a fundamental imbalance in asking producers in the EU operating in a high cost economy, producing to a high standard to compete in a globalised market against those with a much lower cost base; also believes that implementing effective measures which recognizes this is required in order to prevent farmers’ incomes being negatively impacted;
Amendment 35 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 7
Paragraph 7
7. Stresses the need to increase the competitiveness and sustainability of European agriculture and calls for financial resources to be made available to meet these objectives; points out that as the CAP has evolved it has been assigned new objectives in terms of climate mitigation, environmental protection and the provision of public goods; believes that new funding streams should be examined such as EU LIFE and the Globalization fund to support these;
Amendment 44 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 9
Paragraph 9
9. Highlights the continuing imbalances in the food supply chain with primary producers being considerably weaker than other actors both upstream and down stream in the chain; urges the Commission to take action to improve the transparency of prices and margins in the food supply chain; highlights Parliament’s position on unfair trading practices.;