The European Parliament rejected (363 votes to 267, with 43 abstentions) a motion for a resolution, tabled on behalf of the Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development, which sought to object to the Commission's delegated regulation of 15 February 2017 amending Delegated Regulation (EU) No 639/2014 as regards the control measures relating to the cultivation of hemp, certain provisions on the greening payment, the payment for young farmers in control of a legal person, the calculation of the per unit amount in the framework of voluntary coupled support, the fractions of payment entitlements and certain notification requirements relating to the single area payment scheme and the voluntary coupled support, and amending Annex X to Regulation (EU) No 1307/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council.

Members who tabled the motion for a resolution argued that by presenting this delegated regulation, the Commission severely undermined the prerogatives of Parliament as co-legislator on both procedure and content.

On a procedural note, Members stated that bundling and presenting 14 empowerments as one single Commission delegated regulation leaves no room to express an opinion on each empowerment individually.

In terms of the content, Members stressed that the Commission delegated regulation goes well beyond a pure simplification measure and will have a fundamental impact on the implementation of the common agricultural policy (CAP).

They argued that the prohibition of phytosanitary protection of leguminous crops on Ecological Focus Areas threatens sustainable domestic protein production in line with the EU protein strategy, when Europe already heavily depends on imports of protein.