EU farm body calls for empowerment of farming co-ops

The umbrella organisation representing EU farm organisations has called for competition rules to be changed across Europe to enable farming co-operatives to exercise more power in the supply chain.

Copa-Cogeca has also recommended the creation of a ''European Food Trading Agency'' that would include European ''Food Trading Ombudsman''.

EU farm leaders attending a Copa-Cogeca meeting in Brussels on Tuesday (May 4) unanimously approved a position on ways to promote EU farmers and the position of agri-cooperatives in the food supply chain.

In particular they called for the European Commission and member states to take action to promote fair contractual practices and ban unfair and abusive practices.

Speaking after the meeting, Cogeca president Paulo Bruni said EU farmers and consumers were facing increasing price volatility for agricultural and retail food products.

On top of that, farmers' returns are being squeezed across Europe to the extent that they now only receive some 20% of the price consumers have to pay for their food. Only 10 years ago this figure was 30%.

''One of the reasons is that farmers and their cooperatives are now up against the huge buying power of a handful of processors and supermarkets. It is ultimately the use of this market power in commercial transactions along the food chain that leads to unfair practices,'' he said.

Bruni said Copa-Cogeca wanted to see better prices for farmers and agri-cooperatives and outlined the measures EU farmers wanted Brussels and member states to adopt to achieve this.