It was a real blast from the past to see former European Commissioner Janusz Wojciechowski commenting on the current CAP negotiations in this week’s Journal.
The Dealer got a sneak preview of the article and it made for sobering reading.
Irish officials will certainly not welcome his intervention, given that the Pole was pretty scathing of the latest CAP proposals.
Indeed, the former agriculture commissioner appears to be singularly unimpressed by Ireland’s CAP efforts to-date.
Wojciechowski bemoans Ireland’s inability or unwillingness to push back against the budget cuts that have been set out by Ursula von der Leyen and her colleagues.
However, the Pole is not solely fixated on budgets.
He questions the wisdom of scrapping Pillar 2, suggests that food security should be treated on a par with national defence, and asks if CAP can survive if it does not remain a “sovereign policy, free from political conditions unrelated to agriculture”.
Clearly, Wojciechowski understands the visionary nature of CAP.
Sadly, this understanding is not widely shared among Ireland and Europe’s current political ‘elite’.
