Unclear impact on competitiveness and modest environmental ambition. The Agriculture Commission rebels: sustainability is not only environmental

The actions of the European Unioner to restructure and avoid oversupply in the wine sector do not directly pursue the objective of competitiveness. The primary objective of the restructuring measure is to increase the competitiveness of wine-growers, while the planting authorisation system aims to achieve market stability by limiting the increase in vine plantings, so as to avoid the surplus production observed in the past. The scheme also has the capacity to improve the competitiveness of winegrowers if Member States decide to use specific criteria when granting authorisations for new plantings. These are the observations contained in the special report "Restructuring measures and authorisations for the planting of vineyards in the EU - Unclear impact on competitiveness and modest environmental ambition", signed by the European Court of Auditors, which found that the regulatory framework in this sector to make winegrowers more competitive has shortcomings in terms of design and implementation. Moreover, it does not allow the environmental objectives of the CAP to be achieved, thus recommending to the EU Commission to make the restructuring measure and the plant authorisation system more targeted at promoting competitiveness, or to increase the environmental ambition of the policy in the wine sector.

A report, that of the European Court of Auditors, which has displaced the world of European agricultural policy and wine entrepreneurship, as emerged today from the "States General of wine", the comparison between representatives of the Government, EU institutions, Regions and stakeholders on competitiveness, exports, sustainability and tourism in the sector, staged in the Sala della Protomoteca of the Campidoglio, in Rome, where the topic came up with a certain spontaneity in the debate. Herbert Dorfmann, MEP and in the Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development and Rapporteur of the Farm to Consumer Strategy, said he was "amazed", underlining that "the EU Court of Auditors is different from the Italian one, they are not judges, but limit themselves to analysis of EU public spending, assessing whether a given item of expenditure has been able to achieve the objectives it had set itself or not. This report is completely misleading, and large-scale stupid. He says the EU's commitment to wine does not meet targets because it does not meet sustainability requirements. But sustainability is not only environmental, it is also economic. The problem is that today for Brussels all public spending must be put on environmental sustainability, as if it were the only public good, but so are jobs, economy and landscape. The report is what it is, fortunately the EU Commission responded immediately, stressing that the goal of the CAP on wine is not only sustainability", added Dorfmannn.

Along the same lines, my colleague, in Parliament and in the Commission, Paolo De Castro, rapporteur of the Reform of Geographical Indications, but also Lamberto Frescobaldi, president of the Italian Wine Union (UIV) and Albiera Antinori, president of the Federvini Wine Group: "reading the document of the Court of Auditors was enlightening in its own way, it is a numerical analysis, made by people who do not think we have a minimum connection with agriculture, it is a comparison between money spent and benefits received that could be made on all sectors", comments Albiera Antinori. "It does not take into account everything that has come out in terms of image and product quality, but those who read it and are in the sector realize that they have in front of them a document that does not bring anything good, supported by an attitude is suspicious, as if the sector had unduly taken advantage of these resources", says Albiera Antinori.

Returning to the contents of the report, starting from 2016 - recalls the European Court of Auditors - winegrowers can request authorizations for the planting of new vineyards, authorizations that are free and that can be distributed proportionally and / or on the basis of eligibility and priority criteria. The purpose of this plant authorisation system is to enable progressive growth, while avoiding oversupply capacity that would have negative environmental and social effects. The Court therefore sought to ascertain whether the restructuring measure and the planting authorisation system had actually contributed to making winegrowers more competitive and wine production more environmentally sustainable, examining how the measure had been set up in the context of the CAP strategic plans to assess the degree of environmental ambition of those plans, assuming that this is a significant measure, worth more than €5 billion for the period 2014-2023, and that it had not been audited by the Court since 2012.

The conclusion of this work is that the regulatory framework in this sector, in order to make winegrowers more competitive, has shortcomings in terms of design and implementation. Furthermore, it does not achieve the environmental objectives of the common agricultural policy. The framework governing the restructuring measure lacks adequate definitions, coherent strategies and relevant indicators. The five Member States visited (Czech Republic, Greece, Italy, France and Spain) funded all eligible applications, and did not use criteria to select projects that promoted competitiveness. These Member States also financed projects for which no structural changes were observed. Neither the Commission nor the Member States we visit assess how projects contribute to the competitiveness objective, and beneficiaries are not required to report how restructuring has made them more competitive.

The planting authorisation system aims to avoid oversupply by limiting the annual increase in wine-growing area by 1 %, but no impact assessment was carried out before this limitation was proposed and adopted by the co-legislators. Member States also have the possibility to limit growth in certain production areas. Therefore, the increase at regional and local level could be well above the 1% limit, and Member States are not required to assess the impact of this growth. We noted that the restructuring of old vineyards can significantly increase production, and at the time of granting authorisations, the Member States visited used only a limited number of eligibility criteria and competitiveness priorities, and authorisations are often distributed on a pro rata basis. Beneficiaries are allocated very small parcels: this can make advance planning impossible, potentially jeopardising the achievement of the competitiveness objective, reads the special report of the European Court of Auditors.

It noted that the measure and system audited only partially integrated environmental protection, despite the substantial funding involved. The five Member States visited had not assessed the expected environmental impact of their national support programmes, and the policy objectives and targets set for the restructuring measure were unambitious in terms of environmental sustainability. In practice, the projects did not aim to reduce the impact of viticulture on the environment and/or climate. In some cases, we found that the projects could even have the opposite effect, such as switching to varieties that require more water, resulting in the need to install irrigation systems.

Environmental ambition remains low for the 2023-2027 programming period, according to the European Court of Auditors: cross-compliance has been lifted for beneficiaries of the restructuring measure, and Member States must spend at least 5% of the wine sector allocation on climate- and environment-related objectives, but in the context of a greener Common Agricultural Policy, 40 % of planned expenditure must be directed towards achieving climate-related objectives.

WINENEWS.IT