The Diplomat
The Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, Luis Planas, warned yesterday before his EU counterparts of the effects of the war in Ukraine on European agriculture and fisheries, especially the increase in the price of fertilizers due to the increase in the price of gas and the dependence of the fishing fleet on fossil fuels.
During his speech to the Council of Agriculture Ministers of the European Union, held in Brussels, Planas announced a proposal, supported by 15 Member States, with short, medium and long-term measures to ensure the supply of fertilizers to farmers at affordable prices. This proposal complements a communication made by the Commission itself, which, in the opinion of the minister, is a very good analysis of the situation but is not very ambitious and without a sufficient level of concreteness.
Fertilizers, Planas recalled, are essential to ensure production yields, but currently suffer a significant increase in price – 149% between September 2021 and September 2022 in the European Union – as a result of high energy costs, since gas is an essential basic material for their manufacture. This rise in costs has had among its consequences the closure of half of the European ammonia manufacturing plants.
For this reason, the Minister called for an immediate action plan with a comprehensive strategy to ensure the availability of fertilizers and assured that Spain is committed to adopting measures, also in the medium and long term, to improve Europe’s autonomy in the production and supply of fertilizers and to correct the dependence maintained until now on gas and products manufactured in Russia.
On the other hand, Planas expressed the support of the Spanish Government to an initiative of the European Commission to address the energy transition in the fisheries sector, in order to improve its resilience and make it less dependent on fossil fuels. He also warned of the need to renew the fishing fleet, which has a high average age and a propulsion system based on fossil fuels.
Energy is one of the main production costs of the fishing and aquaculture activity, which has been greatly affected by the increase in prices as a result of the war in Ukraine. To address the economic situation, the European Commission has adopted several measures, such as the establishment of a temporary framework that allows State aid of up to 300,000 euros per company or the activation of the crisis mechanism of the European Maritime Fund for Fisheries and Aquaculture (FEMPA), which has enabled Spain to enable support measures to the sector for a total amount exceeding 68 million euros.
During his stay in Brussels, Luis Planas held a bilateral meeting with the new Minister of Rural Affairs of Sweden, Peter Kullgren, who has just completed a month in office, and a trilateral meeting with the Ministers of Agriculture of Hungary, István Nagy, and Belgium, David Clarinval.
