The COMAGRI calls for guaranteed funding for agriculture within the European Competitiveness Fund
Farm Europe warmly welcome today’s adoption by the European Parliament’s Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development (COMAGRI) of the draft opinion by MEP Carlo Fidanza on the European Competitiveness Fund (ECF).
The ECF constitutes essential additional funding opportunities outside the Common Agriculture Policy (CAP) to contribute to the transition to more efficient food systems. It is therefore essential to explicitly mention agriculture, food security, and agri-food value chains within the ECF. The earmarking must be binding, transparent, predictable and clearly opened to farmers.
The draft opinion identifies the Competitiveness Fund as a key instrument to finance large-scale projects of European interest that exceed the capacity of individual Member States. These investments are considered essential to reinforce the resilience of the EU’s agri-food system, particularly in light of increasing climate, economic, and geopolitical pressures.
Against a backdrop of growing geopolitical instability, the Committee underlines that control over food resources is a key component of economic resilience and contributes to the EU’s broader security and defence capacity. An allocated budget in the ECF for strategic storage capacity for agricultural products and key inputs is therefore essential.
Farm Europe underlines the necessity, as stated in the opinion, of a dedicated ECF support to innovation and water in the agricultural sector, notably water resilience investments (irrigation efficiency, water storage, sustainable management of water resources for agriculture) and digitalisation (precision agriculture, digital services, decision-support tools, and data infrastructures). Such investments are deemed critical to maintaining agricultural production and preserving Europe’s agri-food excellence.
We now urge the European Parliament to confirm this positive signal in plenary. A strong endorsement will provide clear and positive perspectives for the entire agri-food sector.