COGECA opposes trade concessions

COGECA, which represents the interests of over 30,000 agricultural and food co-operatives in the European Union, is strongly opposed to any WTO trade deal that would go beyond the 2003 CAP reform or would put downward pressure on EU product prices.

That message was conveyed to EU Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson by Donal Cashman, president elect of COGECA, whose affiliated co-ops have over nine million farmer members, a turnover of €210 billion and processes and market over 60% of the agricultural food products in the EU.

Mr Cashman, a dairy farmer from White’s Cross in Cork and former president of the Irish Farmers Association, met Mr Mandelson in Brussels.

The meeting was arranged to impress on the Commission that it must stay within the EU negotiating mandate and the Luxembourg CAP reform agreement and that any breach of it is unacceptable as the agrifood sector had been planning on that basis in good faith since 2003.

Mr Cashman said the position of COGECA is that the EU offer of October 28 goes beyond the CAP reform agreement and the EU negotiating mandate and they have called for its withdrawal.

Mr Mandelson yesterday said the fact the EU put a revised offer on the table, after waiting for a year for the US to reveal its own initiative on agricultural domestic support, created the opportunity to move negotiations forward.

But he said: “We have no plans to make a further offer. To do so would further unbalance the negotiation. The time has come for others to match the effort we have made.”