EU - Big Agri Swallowing Up Small Farms

Protecting natural resources such as land, water and seeds is key to general public interest in the face of climate, environmental, and social emergencies. Recent demonstrations in France against proposed mega-basins—and the resultant acts of police violence against demonstrators—are just one example of how citizens are increasingly taking action to protect common interests from private companies and governments that prioritize profit, not people.

Agricultural land makes up 38 percent of EU territory and as attention has honed in on climate struggles and making European agriculture more sustainable, land is featuring more prominently on the European political agenda, sitting at the crux of many current agricultural and societal issues.

According to research carried out at the request of the European Parliament’s AGRI committee, by 2040 the EU could lose an additional 6.4 million farms, leaving a total of about 3.9 million across the EU (a loss of 62 percent compared to 2016).

Farms are growing in size and this move to larger, industrial models allows multi-national companies to increase their own short-term profits, while passing on the long-term costs to farm workers, animals, citizens and the planet.

Perhaps the most concerning element for European citizens is the fact that European policy—and therefore taxpayer money—is funding and driving harmful land concentration.

For example, CAP subsidies are paid per hectare, encouraging companies and farmers to consider land as an asset and speculate as much land as possible in order to receive more money, with few restrictions on how that land must be used.

-eurobserver.com, 14 April 2023