Joint open letter – Input on the proposed Regulation on Carbon Removal Certification
On 30 November 2022, the European Commission proposed a draft Regulation for a EU Carbon Removal Certification Framework (CRCF), which among others includes land-based activities under the concept of carbon farming. The proposal is extremely weak, leaves the door wide open for offsetting and greenwashing, risking significant mitigation deterrence and might even hinder an agroecological transition.
On 17 May, 27 EU NGOs members of the EU Food Policy Coalition send a joint letter to Members of the European Parliament and the Council to emphasize key concerns and priorities for land-based activities in the CRCF.
joint report: SUSTAINABLE FOOD SYSTEMS LAW POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS FOR A MEANINGFUL TRANSITION
As the European Commission prepares for the launch of its proposal on the Sustainable Food Systems Legislative Framework in late September, the EU Food Policy Coalition has published a joint report laying out clear policy recommendations for the SFS Law to ensure a meaningful transition to sustainable food systems across the European Union. Agroecology Europe, together with 22 European Civic Society Organisations members of the EU Food Policy Coation support those key policy recommendations to make our food systems more sustainable and improve the health of EU citizens and ecosystems.
Elections Manifesto – Our Food, Our Health, Our Planet
This Manifesto, published in March 2023, reflects the common demands of
26 of EU Food Policy Coalition participants for better food systems in the EU.
In 2024, more than 400 million citizens from across the Union will have the opportunity to elect their representatives in the European Parliament and shape the agenda for the rest of the decade. The need to build a stronger, fairer and more resilient European Union is clearer than ever.
JOINT PRESS RELEASE - Scientific study shows synthetic pesticides significantly more dangerous than natural ones
More organic farming means less pesticide use and risk
Brussels, Vienna, 23 February 2023 – The European Green Deal’s targets of expanding organic agriculture to 25%, halving pesticide use and risk, and protecting sensitive areas from negative pesticide impacts by 2030 are increasingly making natural pesticides permitted in organic farming the subject of political interest. Lili Balogh, President of Agroecology Europe and farmer emphasizes: “The implementation of the Farm to Fork strategy and the Biodiversity strategy with its pesticide reduction targets is essential to establish resilient agroecological food systems in Europe – and beyond.
Press release - agroecology on the rise in switzerland and in the eu
Agroecology was celebrated this Autumn both in Switzerland with the “Days of Agroecology” and the European Union with the “Month of Agroecology”.
As United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Gutierrez emphasized in his remarks to the High-Level opening of COP27: “Humanity has a choice: cooperate or perish”. Agroecology offers all the tools to opt for the first option.
Joint Statement - More than 326 civil society organisations demand a ban on the export of hazardous chemicals that are forbidden in the EU
The European Commission committed in the EU Green Deal’s Chemicals Strategy for Sustainability Towards a Toxic-Free Environment in 2020 to “lead by example, and, in line with international commitments, ensure that hazardous chemicals banned in the European Union are not produced for export, including by amending relevant legislation if and as needed.” However, the European Commission’s 2023 work programme does not include a much needed legal action to stop this practice.
29 NGOs call on the Parliament and the Council to support the Commission’s proposal on the SUR despite attacks to weaken it and delay its adoption
The 29 co-signing NGOs strongly condemn the attacks to weaken the ambition of the proposal for a Sustainable Use of Plant Protection Products Regulation (SUR) and to delay its adoption. This piece of legislation is crucial to implement the Farm to Fork and Biodiversity Strategies, as well as the Zero Pollution Action Plan, and is therefore key to delivering on the objectives of the Green Deal. The revision of the Directive on the Sustainable Use of Pesticides (SUD) must lead to an ambitious SUR reform, which is an important step towards achieving a toxic free environment, protecting the environment and achieving resilient farming systems capable of securing food production and facing current and future crises.
JOINT LETTER : the urgency of the Integrated Nutrients Management Action Plan
The Commission is working on a new Fertiliser Strategy to “protect our food security”, but the greatest threat to our ability to produce food is climate change and biodiversity collapse, which synthetic fertilisers are making worse. Increases in fertiliser prices are putting farmers under pressure, but this is yet another symptom of a broken model of intensive agriculture. The Commission must look for strategic, holistic, and long-term solutions for balanced nutrients management, not short-term fixes. This Letter co-signed by 9 civil society organisations representing environmental, rural, and farming movements expressing our concerns about the new Fertiliser Communication announced by the Commission and calling for the prompt publication of the Integrated Nutrients Management Action Plan promised under the Circular Economy Action Plan.
Manifesto for establishing minimum standards for public canteens across the eu - by the eu food policy coalition
11 october 2022
This Manifesto presents key policy recommendations for using procurement for a systemic food transformation and aims to inspire the European Commission and the EU Member States as well as regional and local public authorities with seven actionable propositions for establishing minimum standards for public canteens in Europe.
European public canteens, and in particular school meals, are low-hanging fruit for the implementation of the EU Farm to Fork strategy. They can be catalysts for food system transformation if their public spending actions include ambitious requirements that go beyond environmental or ‘green’ requests.
Open letter - Call to adopt without delay the Implementing Regulation harmonising the content and format of the pesticide use records
11 July 2022
This open letter is addressed to the members of the standing Committee on Plants, Animals, Food and Feed (PAFF) and the Commission as chair, in advance of the PAFF meeting this week. The letter is signed by 58 organisations across Europe, including trade unions (representing agriculture workers), environmental, health and beekeeper organisations (including the organisers of the European Citizens Initiative “Save Bees and Farmers”), as well as the European umbrella organisation for organic food and farming.
Joint statement - A strong EU Nature Package to tackle the climate, health and biodiversity crises
16 June 2022
On June 22, the European Commission will publish two crucial legislative proposals to implement the EU Green Deal. The “Nature Protection Package” includes the EU Nature Restoration Law and the revision of the Sustainable Use of Pesticides Directive (the Pesticides Reduction Regulation). In this joint statement, more than 20 civic society organisations, among which Agroecology Europe, call on the Commission to publish the two Regulations on the planned date and introduce ambitious and binding targets to stop irreversible biodiversity breakdown.
Joint statement- Urgent need for precise public data on the use of pesticides across Europe
The 76 undersigned organisations express their deep concerns about the direction the negotiations within trilogues are taking on the reform of the agriculture statistics regulation (SAIO).
We call upon the Member States to support the European Parliament’s proposals ensuring precise data on the use of pesticides are collected and published without further delay.
To ensure that European agriculture shifts away from pesticide intensive practices, we need precise public data on what pesticides are used where, when, on which crops and in what quantities.
Press Release - Agroecology : a path for a sustainable agricultural transition and a tool for peace, on 17 May 2022
While the war in Ukraine continues to wreak havoc, violence and human disruption, the environmental, social and climatic challenges of Europe also dramatically persist, and the Farm to Fork Strategy (F2F) – which aims to cut the use of pesticides by 50%, fertilisers by 20%, and convert 25% of European agricultural land to organic farming – is now confronted with an additional challenge: rising geopolitical tensions.
While agribusiness actors are trying to impose harmful narratives on food security, Agroecology Europe recalls the importance of streghtening Europe’s commitment to the Farm to Fork strategy and build the conditions for peace throughout Europe and beyond, and a sustainable and just future for all on the long run.
Joint open letter: Publication of the revision of the legislation on the sustainable use of pesticides, on 23 March 2022
The war on Ukraine is being exploited by agroindustrial lobbies in the name of “food security” to push for the rolling back of European Green Deal objectives.
With more that 50 civic society organisations, we urge the Commission to show vision and moral conviction by standing by its commitment to the Farm to Fork and Biodiversity Strategies and transitioning away from our current agricultural model and its reliance on external inputs.
Joint open letter: EU food supply and solidarity response to the war in Ukraine
Together with +85 NGOs, Agroecology Europe is calling the European Commission to keep the ambitions high when it comes to F2F & Biodiversity Targets.
The EU must shift towards healthy, socially and environmentally friendly farming practices, such as agroecology, organic farming, and agroforestry, which provide the only path to ensuring long-term food security, food sovereignty, and the overall sustainability of the food systems.
70+ organizations make 10 demands to be urgently taken on board by the Commission for its new pesticide regulation
Over 70 European organizations are sending a joint statement to European Commission Executive Vice-President Timmermans and Health & Food Safety Commissioner Kyriakides to express their deep concern about the lack of ambition of the Commission’s draft proposal for a “Sustainable Use of Plant Protection Products” Regulation to be published on 23 March. They make 10 demands to reach an ambitious Regulation.
Read also the press release.
79 organisations voice their concerns on the reform of pesticides statistics
On behalf of 79 organisations across Europe, including environmental and health associations, beekeepers associations, trade unions, the organisers of the European Citizens’ Initiative “Save Bees and Farmers”, the European umbrella organisation for organic food and farming, and the European association of drinking water and waste water services, we are writing to voice our concerns regarding the ongoing EU reform of agriculture statistics. Specifically, we are concerned about the limited availability of data on the use of plant protection products and other toxic chemicals in agriculture.
Agroecology and the EU Farm to Fork and Biodiversity strategies are Europe’s best hope for a viable and sustainable (food) future
Brussels, the 21 February 2022
The study carried out by Wageningen University and Research and commissioned by CropLife Europe released at the end of January 2022 concludes that the implementation of the F2F and Biodiversity strategies in the EU Green Deal would compromise the European agri–food sector to “lower agricultural yields, to price increases, less European exports and more imports of agricultural products from outside Europe”.
Agroecology Europe underlines that this study is based on a reductionist analysis offarming and food systems, and as such does not constitute a credible basis for questioning the objectives formulated in the EU F2F and Biodiversity strategies and for undermining the perspectives for an agroecological transition in Europe.
The Agroecology Europe Barcelona Letter
Citizens, grassroots organisations, scientists, farmers, and policy makers from all over Europe organised the Third Agroecology Europe Forum in Barcelona, World Sustainable Food Capital 2021, and asked for a strong and immediate transformation of the way we eat, the way we work, and the way we live.
During these three days Agroecology Europe gathered, with the help of sessions moderators and participants, elements that we believe reflect well some of the common recommendations to transform our food systems and promote agroecology and summarised them in the ‘The Agroecology Europe Barcelona Letter’.
Following a participatory process open to Forum participants and Agroecology Europe members, the letter has been revised and finalized and signed by 41 organisations and more than 150 individuals.
open letter to end blind spots on agro-chemicals
08/11/21 – 28 NGO’S calling EU Decision-Makers to end blind spots on agro-chemicals – it is high time for data collection and publication fit to monitor progress towards the Farm to Fork targets!
Invitation for governments to implement coherent and ambitious policies in fostering the agroecological transition
A unifying framework for food systems transformation : A call for governments, private companies & civil society to adopt 13 key principles
The need for transformational change in global agri-food systems has now been widely acknowledged in order to address the climate emergency and the growing environmental , socio-economic and health challenges these systems generate.
Addressing these challenges cannot be achieved alone by incremental improvements to the current industrial model. Instead, a bold paradigm shift is needed to redesign our agri-food systems. Food systems reform will prove critical to meet the Sustainable Development Goals, the targets of the Paris Climate Agreement and Convention on Biological Diversity, and to uphold the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Peasants and Other People Working in Rural Areas.
Over 800 international organisations, farming groups and food experts want agroecology, organic and regenerative agriculture to top the agenda at this year’s UN Food Systems Summit. The voices from six continents are calling on governments and businesses to take action once and for all on the “damaging” status quo in global farming.
This Call to action was initiated by the International Panel of Experts on Sustainable Food Systems (IPES-Food), Agroecology Europe, FiBL Europe, IFOAM – Organics International, and Regeneration International.
- Link to the joint press release
- Link to the list of signatories
- Link to the spanish and french versions of the call
Time to modernise the European data on chemicals used in agriculture
Agroecology Europe joined the call launched by ClientEarth on the 5th of October 2021 and make key recommendations to the Members of the AGRI committee regarding the Commission’s proposal for a regulation on statistics on agricultural input and output (SAIO)
OPEN LETTER FOR THE INTERNATIONAL DAY OF PEASANT STRUGGLES – EUROPE NEEDS MORE FARMERS
17/04/2021 Farmers’ organisations, allies and academics addressed this open letter to EU policy makers to underline the key role of small and medium–sized farmers in the resolution of current social, environmental, and food–related crises at different scales and levels.