MEPs this month backed new Commission proposals to reform the EU system of aids for tobacco production, on which 600,000 farmers, mainly in southern Mediterranean countries, depend on for a living. The new approach is based on providing financial assistance for the production of higher quality tobacco and incentives to encourage growers to switch to alternative crops.
New limits on production are to be imposed through "quotas" and the Commission wants the quota removed as each farmer ceases production or retires. The idea is also to set up a "Tobacco Fund" to finance publicity campaigns drawing attention to the dangers of smoking, and research into developing less harmful varieties of tobacco.
But the debate saw the House divided with, on the one hand, Raul Rosado Fernandes (P, UFE) taking up the cause of the poor farmers and arguing that this was the most suitable crop for the climatic conditions, whereas Budget Committee spokesman, Terry Wynn (UK, PES), took the view that the EU should simply not be subsidising such a dangerous product.
The European tobacco industry would not exist without subsidies, he argued, and indeed this point was confirmed by Commissioner Franz Fischler, who pointed out that European production only accounted for one-third of consumption and this could be easily replaced with imports.
Joe McCartin (EPP Connacht/Ulster) said that this procedure is now a bit meaningless. The MacSharry reform offered maintenance of incomes from agriculture and stabilisation of the rural population, which had not come about. In this decade we have already lost 25 per cent of people engaged in agriculture and incomes have dropped by around 20 per cent. Any improvement in the position of individual farmers had come at the expense of employment in the sector. UK Agricultural Minister Jack Cunningham, charged with brokering a compromise, admitted that it was proving difficult to make headway and that even if the reforms were adopted in their present form, the sector would continue to cost the farm budget Ecu 1 billion per annum.
Mr Cunningham did say however, that there was a consensus among the member states to base reforms on improving quality, but none on the detail, with the producer states supporting a gradual moderation of the premium payable, and the others favouring a reduction in subsidies. There was also disagreement over the Commission's quotas proposal.
The producer member states argued in favour of selling the quotas of retiring farmers in order to maintain the industry and stem rural depopulation, whereas the Commission was opposed to transferring the quotas of those ceasing production. It saw the gradual withdrawal of quotas as a way of gradually reducing the number of growers.
In the vote, a proposed amendment to abandon the sector was lost by 314 to 174, with 21 abstentions, but another amendment, designed to link 30 per cent of specific aid to measures to improve the environment, was adopted.