The European Union’s Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) is having a serious effect on the economies of developing countries, according to Oxfam. Alexander Woollcombe told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that the subsidies paid to European farmers make food produced in the EU cheaper than that grown elsewhere. He commented: “When it is combined with the European Union and other rich countries forcing developing countries to open their agricultural markets, what you get is subsidised, artificially cheaper European food coming into poor countries and wiping out their own national industries.” Prime minister Gordon Brown is calling on other EU leaders to cut the trade-distorting aspects of the CAP subsidies. This would help combat the food crisis, he claims. However, French President Nicolas Sarkozy confirmed last month that he would continue to support the system in order to protect the interests of Europe’s agricultural industries.

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4 June 2008
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