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Vote For The Future: Good Food Good Farming Campaign Culminates in Brussels Demonstration

June 3, 2024 ARC

On June 1st, hundreds of citizens, NGOs, and grassroots movements gathered at Place de l’Albertine in Brussels, urging politicians to improve farmers’ conditions, halt environmental rollbacks, and strengthen climate policies. The demonstration was organized by Good Food Good Farming (GFGF) and Climate Action Network Europe (CAN Europe), uniting environmental and agrifood movements ahead of the EU elections. Report by Pauline Naterstad and Mia Mancini. […]

The Civil Society Guide to Avoiding Electile Disfunction

May 17, 2024 ARC

With the European elections just around the corner, civil society is revving up for the next mandate. Ahead of the vote, ARC2020 has compiled a one-stop shop of resources from farming, environmental, and food civil society organisations. Interestingly, there is a lot of overlap between these sectors in what is a fascinating set of tools for action. Let’s have a look at some of them. […]

Confidential Legal Advice on CAP Fast Track Uncovered – Critique of a Meek Opinion

April 20, 2024 Oliver Moore

Under pressure from farmer protests, upcoming elections and its own cowardice in the face of climate and biodiversity collapse, the political establishment in Brussels and beyond is fast-tracking the evisceration of CAP’s environmental elements. This rush job began on 15th March with a proposal from the Commission, and will likely end Thursday 25th when the last full plenary of the Parliament rubber stamps the proposed regulation. The latest piece of sequencing was confidential legal advice given to the European Parliament on the process. In part one Natasha Foote outlined the proposal and the legal advice. Here Oliver Moore applies a critical analysis to shortcomings therein. […]

Feeding Ourselves 2024 – A Food Revolution Starts With Seed!

April 16, 2024 Adèle Pautrat

Our Seeds4All project was back in Ireland in March to be part of Feeding Ourselves 2024. We are inheritors of a genetic commons that we have to protect. While working on the ground we need to be vigilant about what is happening at legal level – and work together. In partnership with the Irish Seed Savers Association, Seeds4All brought a European perspective to Cloughjordan, Co. Tipperary. Adèle Pautrat reports. […]

Green CAP on the Chopping Block – Commission to Cut CAP’s Environmental Ambitions with no Impact Assessment

March 13, 2024 Natasha Foote

The European Commission plans to shift the EU’s farming subsidy programme from mandatory requirements towards a more ‘voluntary’ approach, proposing to slash or weaken a range of environmental measures, according to a leak of the EU executive’s plans. […]

Plan to Loosen EU Rules on Genetic Technologies Passes First Parliament Hurdle

January 25, 2024 Natasha Foote

The EU’s proposal to loosen the rules around the use of new genetic technologies in plant breeding has been greenlit by the European Parliament’s environment committee, meaning it is now on its way for a full Parliamentary vote in February. […]

Missing Targets and Making Partnerships – Denmark and Climate Change

January 17, 2024 Rasmus Blædel Larsen

When it comes to greenhouse gas emissions reductions, there is a dynamic tension between the ambitious aims of the EU and its member states on the one hand, and the realities of embedded, entrenched elements of the economy such as agri-food on the other. The European Union set target in 2021: a 50% reduction in Greenhouse Gas emissions (GHG) by 2030. Progress remains however, slow. Progress is especially slow in agriculture. Rasmus Larsen unpacks the situation in one of Europe’s intensive agriculture strongholds, Denmark, where, after faltering misfires, a new three way partnership has been proposed. What is this, and will it work? […]

Genetically Modified Crops Aren’t a Solution to Climate Change, Despite What the Biotech Industry Says

December 19, 2023 ARC

The European Commission launched a proposal to deregulate a large number of plants manufactured using new genetic techniques. Biotech firms seem to have succeeded in convincing the European Commission that we need new genetically modified crops to tackle climate change. They argue that by enhancing crops’ resistance to drought or improving their ability to capture carbon, climate change may no longer seem such a daunting challenge. If this seems too good to be true, unfortunately, it is. […]

Indoor Farming – Sustainability Spin or Substance?

December 6, 2023 Andrea Beste

Indoor farming is a growth area, proposed as a solution for a number of problems in the agri-food system. So what is it, and how do we separate the spin from the substance? Andrea Beste with more. […]

Seeds of Europe – Centering Small Producers’ Voices in Seed Law Reform

December 5, 2023 Mathieu Willard

On November 28, in collaboration with SEED Luxemburg and the Greens/EFA, the Seeds4All project took part in the organisation of a conference at the European Parliament on the future of seeds. Delving into the heart of the matter, the main aim of the event was to spotlight the specific voices and urgent demands of artisan seed producers in the context of the reform of the European legislative framework applicable to the sale and exchange of seeds. […]

Bottom-Up AKIS – An Inclusive Stakeholder Engagement Strategy

November 23, 2023 Shane Conway

Soil-specific human capital is not easily transferable, communicated or learnable. Future multi-actor EIP-AGRI projects will be unsuccessful if they do not learn from the farming community’s invaluable store of locally specific tacit and lay knowledge. Dr Shane Conway reports on the PREMIERE Horizon Europe Project. […]

Îles de Résilience : Parcs Naturels en France & en Allemagne

November 22, 2023 Marie-Lise Breure-Montagne

Dans cet article, mettre en avant l’expérience des parcs naturels régionaux est une manière de poursuivre une analyse croisée des trajectoires France / Allemagne, vers la construction de territoires ruraux plus résilients. Deux secteurs économiques : l’éco-tourisme et l’agriculture durable tentent de s’y développer, non sans quelques conflits de priorité. […]

Pesticide Regulation Progresses to Plenary Following Environment Committee Vote

October 25, 2023 Ashley Parsons

The Environment Committee in the European Parliament (ENVI) has ensured a core part of the EU Green Deal – the pesticide regulation – progress towards completion. In a vote yesterday (24th October) the SUR – sustainable use of pesticides regulation – saw some changes introduced, but progress maintained. Despite many delays over the regulation since last June, the SUR text will now face a plenary vote by all Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) in November. […]

L’eau, bien commun … risques climatiques, destin commun. Part 2/2

October 23, 2023 Marie-Lise Breure-Montagne

Nous allons dans cette deuxième partie aborder la résilience des systèmes assurantiels en agriculture, fonction tenue par la réassurance publique (France, Espagne) ou privée (Allemagne)… ou ultimement, par la solidarité nationale. L’Europe constate ces disparités entre pays européens, alors que la crise climatique permanente s’invite chaque année avec plus de mordant. […]

CAP Social Conditionality: A Game Changer for Farm Workers?

October 4, 2023 Mathieu Willard

In a new CAP that largely maintains the status quo, social conditionality emerges as one of the few truly innovative elements. But is it going to be a real game-changer? This new legislative tool has the potential to improve the working conditions of millions of farm workers. But does it offer the means to achieve this goal? In this article, we will explore what can be anticipated and discuss ways to enhance its effectiveness. […]