The increasing role of climate change in community policy, with special regard to the common agricultural policy

Baksa, Adrienn

Keywords: climate change, EU, climate policy, Common Agricultural Policy, rural development

Europe will also feel the impact of the global effects of climate change. This makes it highly necessary that the European Union include adaptation and mitigation measures in its policies. On a longer term, however, a coordinated and financially backed EU climate strategy is needed. The changing climate is a key factor in the development of European agriculture and rural areas, and therefore the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) of the near future should be formulated accordingly.
The Community’s rural development measures for 2007-2013 promote sustainable production, and many of them encourage mitigation. Therefore the EU has re-allocated additional rural development resources to mitigate the impact of climate change and to promote adaptation. I think that this immediate action taken by the EU is a positive move. The usefulness of these measures will, however, be difficult to assess at the EU-27 level because no single system exists to measure the results.
The main goal of this paper is to highlight the importance of CAP with respect to climate change.

Full article