Branko RAVNIK

Agriculture is an economic activity, which regardless of time and space attracts a lot of social attention. The main focus of the activity is certainly ensuring an adequate food security for meeting the basic needs of humanity. However, the meaning and the role of agriculture is a significantly more complex question than just this. Due to its influence on social and economic position it always had a special management regime.

Agriculture can efficiently respond to challenges of modern time only when it is developing according to sustainability principles – coordinated consideration of agricultural market, environmental care and efforts for social equilibrium.

The public accepts such multifunctional role of agriculture and is aware that amenities connected to agriculture cannot be ensured only by enforcement of market legality but must include also regulative and incentive public policy.

Slovenian Presidency is aware that:

  agriculture is an important economic activity, which permanently ensures food security
     with production of qualitative and safe food; 
  agriculture with its non-productive functions ensures preservation of environment, natural resources
    and other publicly important goods; 
  CAP has been over decades ensuring that agriculture is being sustained and developed throughout
    the EU and in long-term enabling a sustainable preservation of resources for production of food; 
  agriculture has over decades undergone different treatments in the current EU Member States and
    has today a different economic, social, environmental and cultural role and that natural conditions
    for farming are different in individual countries; 
  public attitude towards the role and the meaning of agriculture through different periods has been
    changing and has an important role in directing the agricultural policy; 
  a stable agricultural policy is a foundation of a successful development of agriculture, which cannot
    be adjusted over night and so that there will not be any negative consequences it needs sound and
    carefully planned measures, known long beforehand; 
  the agriculture policy needs to successfully respond to new challenges (climate change,
    globalization and literalisation of agricultural markets, ect.) and in time point out the solutions and
    measures that are going to enable ensuring the expected multifunctional role of agriculture.

One of the priorities of Slovenian Presidency is to carry out a debate on continuing the CAP reform from 2003 and to make great efforts to get common conclusions regarding the necessary adjustments by 2013, which would at the same time show the guidelines after 2013.

Therefore, we estimate that it is especially important that the conclusions include the emphases, with which we are determining that in a debate on a further CAP reform the most important challenges of agriculture and rural areas in the future were established.

We agree that independently of a debate in the context of the HC a debate regarding the challenges with which agriculture will be faced in the next decade mainly from the point of view of food and environmental security has to continue. We agree that food and environmental security will be in the next decades key questions of a sufficient scope of food production and ensuring a sustainable use of space. Thereby the EU needs to have a responsible role.

Due to the above mentioned and before further debates on amendments of agricultural policy are carried out it is necessary to carry out a wide public debate on the meaning and the role of agriculture in the future. Positions of the leading politicians in this field are very important, since they influence the awareness of the whole society regarding the importance of this field.