Belgium (Brussels Morning Newspaper), Soil health is essential for sustainable farming. However, 60-70 % of EU soils are unhealthy, in part due to current soil and manure management practices.
The common agricultural policy (CAP) has a number of financial and legislative tools intended to encourage improvements in soil and manure management, and the Nitrates Directive caps the application of nitrogen from livestock manure in polluted areas.
The European Court of Auditors, in a new study, has assessed whether the European Commission and member states made effective use of available EU tools for managing agricultural soils and manure sustainably.
The auditors, who are based in Luxembourg, assessed whether the conditions of the EU’s direct farm payments to farmers were ambitious enough, whether the member states targeted the EU rural development funding well, and the impact of derogations.
The audit covered the period from 2014 to 2020 and also looked forward to the period from 2023 to 2027.
The audit sample included five countries: Germany, Ireland, Spain, France, and the Netherlands.
The ECA’s special reports set out the results of its audits of EU policies and programs or management topics in relation to specific budgetary areas.
The ECA selects and designs these audit tasks to be of maximum impact by considering the risks to performance or compliance, the level of income or spending involved, forthcoming developments, and political and public interest.
Separately, the auditors claim that the EU’s 2030 climate and energy targets are at risk.
They say that the EU’s achievement of its 2020 climate and energy targets was partly due to external factors such as the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, which contributed to reducing emissions. The auditors question whether the EU’s bid to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 55% compared to 1990 levels by 2030 can become a success story, as they found little indication that actions to achieve 2030 climate and energy targets will be sufficient. These are the main conclusions of a report published today by the European Court of Auditors.
