Newsletter Nr. 3 now out
International conference on the future of the CAP
On April 16 an international conference on the future of the CAP was organised by the Groupe de Bruges in collaboration with the Associazione Alessandro Bartola
Interview Arie van den Brand for Jeunes Agriculteurs
Groupe de Bruges' president, Arie van de Brand explained the history of the Groupe de Bruges as well as its views on the CAP in the latest issue of Jeunes Agriculteurs, a monthly magazine with some 65,000 subscribers.
Mr Dacian CIOLOS new Agriculture Commissioner
Since a few months, the European agricultural policy has a new boss: Mr Dacian CIOLOS, Minister of Agriculture of Romania in the years 2007 and 2008. It is expected that he and the other members of the new EU Commission will assume his new job on February 1st 2010. Although Ciolos was among all candidates campaigning exclusively for the Agriculture Department, he is also one of the most suitable for this portfolio.
Mr Dacian CIOLOS was born in 1969 and comes from the Romanian Zalau, about 50 miles northwest of Cluj-Napoca. He studied agriculture with a focus on horticulture. He graduated from the University of Agricultural Sciences and Veterinary Medicine in Cluj. In the 1990s, followed by further studies (e.g. "Production and Rural Development") at the Ecole Nationale Superieure Agronomique (Ensar) in Rennes and many months of practice at the regional organic organisation in Brittany and at the Agriculture Chambre of Aveyron. In 1997 he obtained his Master's degree from the Université Montpellier I. The National Institute (INRA) for agricultural research in Montpellierawarded him a doctorate in 2001.
In 2002-2003 the new agricultural commissioner was Task Manager for Agriculture and Rural Development at SAPARD and furthermore responsible for Romania's EU delegation. From 2005 to 2007 he was appointed as an adviser to the Minister and representatives of the Special Committee on Agriculture of the European Council to the Romanian Ministry of Agriculture. From October 2007 until December 2008 Dacian Ciolos was Minister of Agriculture of Romania and in this capacity as non-party candidate he offered a guarantee for the prevention of corruption in the context of the CAP money flow into Romania, that resulted from Romania’s accession in 2007. As the government lost the election at the end of 2008, he was appointed chairman of the presential committee on agriculture and rural development for the Romanian president.
Mr Dacian Ciolos is a founding member of the organization "Agroecology", which was established in 1995, a globally oriented organization geared to develop sustainable food systems and to promote the application of agroecological research findings to solve global food and agri-environmental problems.
Ciolos became a member of the Groupe de Bruges in the year 2000. In the fall of 2008, still acting as Romanian minister for agriculture, Ciolos, in conjunction with the Groupe de Bruges, organized a conference that was devoted to an issue that is not only extremely important for central Europe, namely "smallholder agriculture". This showed, in contrast to the already here and there rashly expressed opinions about his possible European policy priorities (such as preference for the enlargement countries or large-scale agriculture) not only his personal affinities, but also offers a rather good starting point for the policy priorities of the new EU agricultural commissioner to come to a balanced, fair and common European policy for agriculture and rural areas.
By Dr. Franz Greif, member of the Groupe de Bruges
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