BRITISH AND European farmers have good opportunities to succeed in the global market-place, despite the gradual erosion of taxpayer support and the emergence of Brazil as a big commodity producer.
"Europe has many advantages," director of agriculture at the OECD Stefan Tangerman told the Agra-Europe conference. "It has among the best climates in the world, the best soils and well-educated farmers. They are close to large markets, with good infrastructure and highly efficient food industries."
Prof Tangerman admitted there were also constraints, most notably the cost of land. "High land prices don"t fall from heaven," he said. "They are the result of support given to farmers which is capitalised in land prices."
ENTITLEMENTS
The recent CAP reforms would not change this, as entitlements were linked to land.
The small scale of much EU farming also undermined competitiveness, so rural development policies were needed to speed adjustment.
But Prof Tangerman played down the importance of higher production standards in the EU, noting that there were greater differences in production costs within countries than between countries. "Farmers the world over complain about the effect of government interference on their costs, but it tends to be exaggerated," he told the conference.
He also dismissed the claim that labour rates were much higher in Europe, pointing to the good wages made by workers in New Zealand, Australia and the USA.