Animal and plant health package: Agriculture committee set to amend proposed rules

The ideas to streamline and simplify current rules, cut the bureaucracy and better prepare the sector but also national and EU authorities to deal with outbreak of animal and plant diseases were welcomed by members of the Agriculture committee.

But they also emphasised the need to prevent further loss of biodiversity, especially when it comes to seeds. Small producers should be better protected and creation of monopolies on the seeds market must be avoided, they insisted.

Preventive actions and traceability must be stepped up, particularly in the view of recent scandals, and producers affected by animal and plant diseases should not be left alone to bear all the costs, they said.

Furthermore, many MEPs insisted that EU must stick to its food safety standards and principles when negotiating the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership with the Unites States.

Next steps

The package of four legislative proposals will now be scrutinised by the Agriculture and other relevant committees. The rapporteurs for each legislative proposal will be determined in coming weeks.

To watch the debate, click on the link below.

Source: EP Press Office – Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development

Watch the debate via VOD (the debate starts at 10.27)

Website of the European Commission on Animal and Plant Health package

Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development