European
OECD says Bertie Ahern got his facts wrong on the EU Common Agricultural Policy (CAP)
By Finfacts Team
Sep 29, 2005, 17:32

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Irish Taoiseach Bertie Ahern and UK Prime Minister Tony Blair. Ahern accused Blair of deception but his own address and article on CAP reform contained false claims.

The European Commision issued a report on the 2004 EU Budget last week which shows that Ireland got net receipts of €1.6 billion - €396 per head of poulation while Dutch taxpayers paid €125 per head to the EU. Ireland in fact received an extra €34 million compared with 2003.

Ahern stringly supported the existing CAP system, criticised UK Prime Minister Tony Blair for seeking reform of the policy but made no reference whatsoever to the pertinent fact that other European taxpayers are paying for Irish farm support.

Bertie Ahern's well paid advisers used OECD facts in his September address and his article in the FT, claiming that the US provided more farm supports than the EU. Today, the OECD said that Ahern's claims were not correct. The EU provides more funds for support of agriculture than the US.

Contrary to Bertie's claims, 2003 farm support in the US stood at $36bn or 15 per cent of farm receipts, while in the EU it was $118bn (€104bn) or 36 per cent of farm receipts.

More than 3,000 Irish farmers receive direct CAP payments of more than €40,000 annually - in effect farm dole. The largest recipient beef baron Larry Goodman, receives more than a half million euros and payment is made for even watching the grass grow. In early September, the UN Human Development Report noted that agriculture supports less than two percent of the EU workforce and more than three-quarters of CAP support goes to the biggest 10% of subsidy recipients.

Bertie Ahern's CAP arguments are simply a menu without prices. A key question for him is why should Dutch, German and other taxpayers support wealthy Ireland's farmers?

See EU Budget 2004 report, other related links

From today's Financial Times:

Farm support transfers to the EU and US cover government services and food subsidies

By Stefan Tangerman
Published: September 29 2005 03:00 | Last updated: September 29 2005 03:00

From Mr Stefan Tangermann.

Sir, The article by Bertie Ahern, the Irish prime minister (September 26), quotes statistics on farm support published by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development in its annual monitoring and evaluation report on agricultural policies in OECD countries.

However, some of the numbers quoted are not exact. The figure for the United States seems to refer to our estimate of total transfers to the agricultural sector ($92bn in 2003), equivalent to 0.84 per cent of gross domestic product.

Transfers to agriculture in the European Union (15 members) were larger than indicated in the article, namely $132bn (€117bn) in 2003, corresponding to 1.26 per cent of GDP.

Let me also point out that these transfers include government services to the agricultural sector overall, such as research and infrastructure, and food subsidies such as food stamps in the US.

The OECD also publishes statistics on support to farmers. In 2003, such support in the US stood at $36bn or 15 per cent of farm receipts, while in the EU it was $118bn (€104bn) or 36 per cent of farm receipts.

Stefan Tangermann,

Director for Food, Agriculture and Fisheries,

Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development,

75016 Paris, France