Скачать или смотреть EUROPE: DENMARK'S EU NOMINEE CALLS FOR END TO FARM SUBSIDIES

(6 Jan 1995) English/Nat

Denmark's nominee for European Environment Commissioner is calling for an end to farm subsidies in the European Union.

Ritt Bjerregaard wants to channel the 86 (b) billion dollar Agriculture budget into Eastern Europe to speed its integration into the Union.

Her comments have outraged farmers and drawn strong criticism from some of her own colleagues.

Ritt Bjerregaard is looking to the future when she enters the European Commission later this month.

The integration of East European farmers into a broader European agricultural community.

But West European farmers want the existing protection left untouched.

The EU's Common Agriculture Policy is the single biggest burden on European taxpayers and Bjerregaard knows to win the fight against protected farmers will almost be impossible to win.

SOUNDBITE:
"This would be the big political deep end and the big political problem because , I mean a lot of them will think that look now we are getting less and then we will be against having those new countries in because we want to keep what we already achieved, because if you want to reduce the support, somebody will get less, that is the result of it."
SUPER CAPTION: Danish nominee Ritt Bjerregaard.

Agriculture in Poland shows the contrast between East and West.

These farmers have no subsidies and rely on farming methods their West European colleagues left behind decades ago.

Bjerregaard has sympathy for these Polish farmers.

Those in the West are the most protected in the world, their incomes are propped up by taxpayers.

And their lobby representatives have the ears of many legislators in the European Commission.

SOUNDBITE:
"I think you always have to respect the system you are going into and having been in politics in Denmark for more than 20 years I know I'm not able to change everything overnight or say a year. So what I will try to do is figure out how to handle this situation so that I can achieve some things better."
SUPER CAPTION: Danish nominee Ritt Bjerregaard.

Her fight to see East European farmers treated on an equal basis with those in Western Europe is not likely to be considered seriously until the end of the century when agriculture policy is reviewed.

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