On March 8th, 2017, AREPO participated in the Conference on the future of the Common Agriculture Policy (CAP) after 2020, organised by the NAT Commission of the European Committee of Regions (CoR).
The CoR is currently working on an exploratory opinion on (CAP) post 2020, requested by the European Commission’s Vice-President Frans Timmermans. This opinion will feed into a communication on simplifying and modernising the CAP, which is due to be published in November 2017.
In the morning, the conference launched the debate on all aspects of the future CAP from local and regional perspective.
In the afternoon, the rapporteur on the opinion, Guillaume Cros (FR/PES), Vice-President of the Occitanie regional council, met with representatives of local and regional authorities and other stakeholders for a consultation and an exchange of views on this important topic.
AREPO contributed to the discussion in the stakeholder meeting to highlight the important role of Geographical Indications (GIs) concerning the socio-economic and environmental challenge that we are facing.
In fact GIs represent in many cases good practices with an interesting potential to enhance agricultural sustainability. They can be thought of as ways of conserving biological resources, maintaining both biodiversity and traditional knowledge.
Furthermore, the environmental sustainability of these products is closely linked to social sustainability. GIs are extremely important for the sustainability of rural livelihood, especially in mountainous and disadvantaged areas which they help keeping populated. In this context the sustainable use of resources is a key factor for these products that are dependent upon the reproduction of local resources.
For all these reasons, GIs importance should be recognized in the future EU Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) and they should receive adequate support.
Click here to consult the discussion document for the stakeholder meeting: EN FR
