RSPB voices CAP threat to wildlife

15 September 1997

RSPB voices CAP threat to wildlife

THE Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) said European Union (EU) plans to reform the Common Agricultural Policy will mean wildlife and the countryside will suffer from chronic lack of funding.

It said a budget that is five times greater to the one proposed needs to be devoted to environmental protection.

Pesticides on farms and the practice of ploughing-under had killed flocks of wild birds and destroyed nest sites, it said. It launched an attack on the failure of conservation programmes to rescue the countrys most endangered birds.

The EUs Agenda 2000 farm reform plans mean farmers will be offered payments in compensation for the entry of Eastern European countries, and to comply with agreements to loosen barriers to world trade. The cost is forecast to rise by £10 billion to £40bn a year by 2006.

• The Daily Telegraph 15/09/97 page 8
  
• The Independent 15/09/97 page 2