{"text":[[{"start":9.95,"text":"Since the EU’s earliest days, angry farmers have wasted no opportunity to take to the barricades when confronted with centralised policies they dislike. "}],[{"start":20.799999999999997,"text":"From the 1960s onwards, any serious talk of reforms affecting their industry has been guaranteed to bring labourers and landowners from the fields to do battle with Brussels riot police. Often, they have won."}],[{"start":35.05,"text":"The decades-long tradition continued in December, when tractors dumped muck and growers hurled potatoes on the streets of Belgium’s capital. The offending policy was a blockbuster trade deal between the EU and the Mercosur bloc of Latin American countries, which beef, dairy and poultry producers fear will drive them out of business. "}],[{"start":56,"text":"But this time, despite huge pressure from the farming lobby, the European leadership did not cave — or, at least, not completely. "}],[{"start":64.15,"text":"On May 1, decades of resistance by the agricultural lobby were broken when the trade deal came into effect. Member states earlier voted narrowly to apply the pact, albeit with significant concessions to assuage the farmers and their powerful special-interest groups. European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen exercised her power to over-rule legal challenges to the deal to ensure it came into provisional force."}],[{"start":null,"text":"

"}],[{"start":89.2,"text":"It was a moment that suggested the long-held power of the farmers could be weakening. Through political protection and heavy subsidies, European farming has been designed not only to secure food supplies but also to preserve a rural way of life. The result is a sector that remains dominated by small family farms even as agriculture elsewhere in the world has consolidated and industrialised."}],[{"start":116.05000000000001,"text":"But the Mercosur deal has shown that the model may be coming under strain, just as policymakers are debating the future of the subsidy regime that underpins it. "}],[{"start":125.15,"text":"In the coming months, Brussels will decide on the next iteration of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), the complex system of agricultural subsidies that consumes around a third of the bloc’s common budget. "}],[{"start":138.8,"text":"Farming groups say trade deals and other reforms threaten Europe’s food security at a time of growing geopolitical risk and just as farmers come under even more pressure as the Gulf crisis forces up fuel and fertiliser prices. "}],[{"start":152.55,"text":"“European farmers and agri-cooperatives are once again facing a convergence of external shocks that disrupt production, drive up input costs, and put farm viability under severe strain,” says Elli Tsiforou, secretary-general of farming union Copa-Cogeca. “Are we going to push certain sectors to extinction?” she adds."}],[{"start":null,"text":""}],[{"start":171.3,"text":"But supporters of reform to the system argue that Europe’s priority has to be competing in this new geopolitical world, rather than shielding farmers from market forces with a safety net of subsidies. "}],[{"start":183.35000000000002,"text":"“How can we move forward investing in research and innovation if we are still spending so much on the old economy?” counters one EU diplomat. “How can we reduce dependencies if we can’t do trade deals because of the concerns of a small subset of farmers?”"}],[{"start":201.15000000000003,"text":"Some believe these heavy subsidies are slowing down market-driven restructuring that could replace failing family farms with more efficient, large-scale agribusinesses — as is happening already in parts of southern Europe. The impact on overall food production would be limited, they say."}],[{"start":218.90000000000003,"text":"Others warn an industry reliant on state support and exports also represents a geopolitical weakness, hamstringing economic growth. The farmers willing to bully the EU are in turn making the bloc more vulnerable to bullying from the US and China, they say."}],[{"start":235.75000000000003,"text":"“China, like the EU, recognises there’s a cow in every commune and a pig in every parish,” says John Clarke, the former chief agricultural trade negotiator for the EU. “Many EU leaders are either dependent on the rural vote or fearful of it . . . In the short term it gives China some leverage.” "}],[{"start":null,"text":"

---

"}],[{"start":254.10000000000002,"text":"The EU’s Common Agricultural Policy, established in 1962, was designed to ensure the continent could feed itself after the shortages of the second world war. It did so by supporting prices, subsidising production and shielding the sector from external competition."}],[{"start":270.5,"text":"For much of the second half of the 20th century, that model succeeded. Advances in fertilisers, pesticides and crop science drove a surge in output, turning Europe from a region of scarcity into one of surplus. By the 1980s, however, the system was producing more than it could consume, with Brussels buying up excess food to support prices. This was the era of “butter mountains” and “wine lakes”."}],[{"start":297.25,"text":"Rather than dismantling the system, policymakers adjusted it. Production quotas were introduced to limit supply, while subsidies continued to guarantee farmers’ incomes. Dutch dairy farmer Jos Verstraten recalls neighbours joking that his father had become a “civil servant”, filling in forms in return for state support."}],[{"start":null,"text":""}],[{"start":318.15,"text":"From the early 2000s, further reforms shifted subsidies away from production and towards land ownership, often tied to environmental conditions. Farmers were encouraged to diversify — producing higher-value goods or managing land — while quotas such as limits on milk output were gradually scrapped."}],[{"start":336.5,"text":"They also became entrepreneurs, as they sought to replace subsidy income with value-added products such as wine and cheese and identified new markets overseas. Milk quotas were abolished in 2015 to encourage production for export."}],[{"start":351.35,"text":"As one former Dutch minister puts it, “we import soyabeans, feed them to animals, export meat and milk and are left with a huge pile of shit”. "}],[{"start":360.5,"text":"The EU agrifood trade surplus was €50bn in 2025. Exports were up 1 per cent to a record high of €238.4bn making the EU the world’s largest agrifood exporter. Imports by value also increased by 9 per cent to €188.6bn, driven by higher prices for coffee, cocoa and tea."}],[{"start":384.4,"text":"Despite exporting far more food than it imports, the underlying model remained intact: a system that cushions farmers from market pressures and allows smaller, less-competitive operations to survive."}],[{"start":397.2,"text":"This has also helped entrench farmers’ political influence. In many EU countries, rural communities remain a significant voting bloc, and governments have been reluctant to push through reforms that threaten livelihoods."}],[{"start":410.34999999999997,"text":"That political sensitivity extends into trade policy. Negotiations have repeatedly been narrowed or delayed as a result, with concessions designed to protect sectors such as beef, dairy and sugar."}],[{"start":423.34999999999997,"text":"After Brussels imposed tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles, Beijing responded by targeting European pork, dairy and cognac — sectors closely tied to rural economies and heavily dependent on exports."}],[{"start":436.29999999999995,"text":"“We have a dependence for certain specific sectors, and we know that,” says a senior Commission official. The lesson is clear: agriculture is often where retaliation lands first, because it is where the political pressure is greatest."}],[{"start":null,"text":""}],[{"start":450.34999999999997,"text":"Trade officials describe the sector as a “soft underbelly” in efforts to “decouple” from China. Measures that might otherwise be economically straightforward become politically difficult when they risk provoking a backlash from farmers."}],[{"start":464.79999999999995,"text":"That tension helps explain the controversy around the Mercosur deal, which creates a free-trade area with a €25tn economy. "}],[{"start":473.59999999999997,"text":"Opening markets can benefit parts of the European economy, but it also exposes some of the most protected and politically sensitive parts of agriculture to competition from lower-cost producers in Brazil and Argentina."}],[{"start":486.2,"text":"The agreement is set to boost EU exports by €50bn annually by 2040, says Thijs Geijer, an economist with Dutch bank ING. But food and agricultural exports would only see €1bn of that. "}],[{"start":500.8,"text":"“It is not good for farming subsectors like beef, poultry and sugar,” he says. “But look at wine, spirits and protected [products] like Parma ham. They will benefit — but the losers put on the most pressure and are very noisy. And farmers stick together.”"}],[{"start":null,"text":"

---

"}],[{"start":517.35,"text":"The question now is what happens when the protection enjoyed by farmers for decades weakens."}],[{"start":522.85,"text":"Farming industry groups argue subsidies are necessary because their industry is unique, both in terms of the role it plays in strategic autonomy and also for its exposure to external risks. "}],[{"start":535.25,"text":"Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which sent food prices soaring, and now the war in Iran, which has rocked fertiliser markets, have buttressed that argument. "}],[{"start":543.8,"text":"Helen O’Sullivan, a beef farmer from County Cork in Ireland, says farmers are being strangled by red tape and rising costs. The price of “fertiliser has gone up, diesel costs have gone up. Steel has gone [up] for building sheds, cement, fuel, everything has gone up,” she says."}],[{"start":null,"text":""}],[{"start":559.6999999999999,"text":"O’Sullivan’s farm of 70 cows was losing money until beef prices increased over the past 18 months, mostly because disease has cut a swath through the cattle population and demand has remained consistent for higher-quality meat."}],[{"start":573.9999999999999,"text":"Fertiliser prices, which were already high before the US and Israel launched strikes against Iran at the end of February, have since soared by up to 80 per cent. "}],[{"start":582.9499999999999,"text":"“Food is increasingly used as a geopolitical weapon, and our dependencies can quickly turn into vulnerabilities. That is why food production and competitiveness must remain at the heart of our policies,” says EU agriculture commissioner Christophe Hansen — himself a farmer from Luxembourg. “In the next CAP, support should be targeted to those who actively contribute to food production.”"}],[{"start":605.15,"text":"Smaller farms are also seen by industry groups as central to Europe’s rural identity. Organisations such as Italy’s biggest farm lobby Coldiretti argue that these holdings sustain not just local economies but landscapes, traditions and food cultures that define much of the continent."}],[{"start":null,"text":""}],[{"start":623.75,"text":"In that view, European agriculture is not easily interchangeable with large-scale production elsewhere. When consumers abroad buy products such as Parmigiano Reggiano cheese or Parma ham, they are paying for origin, methods and heritage as much as for the food itself — qualities that depend on smaller, often family-run farms."}],[{"start":643.65,"text":"Supporters of the current system argue that the CAP plays a central role in preserving that model, helping to keep those farms viable and maintain a form of agriculture that is tied to place as well as production."}],[{"start":655.65,"text":"“Farmers provide nature services, and the EU will continue to pay for those when the market does not. We support, for example, and will continue to do so, farmers in mountain areas to keep sheep on the pastures,” the senior EU official says."}],[{"start":671.1,"text":"“Food and tradition are very important to Europeans. Being a farmer is not a profession like any other,” they add."}],[{"start":null,"text":"

---

"}],[{"start":677.6,"text":"But some experts argue the risk to food security is overstated. Recent studies by the EU’s Joint Research Centre show that if the CAP were removed, agricultural production would only reduce by just over 5 per cent."}],[{"start":692.0500000000001,"text":"“Fertile good land is not going to be left idle if we don’t pay subsidies to farmers,” Alan Matthews, professor of European agricultural policy at Trinity College Dublin, says."}],[{"start":702.2,"text":"He says that to maximise food production and reduce subsidies, the EU needs bigger farms. But that goes against the grain of popular opinion and national culture. "}],[{"start":null,"text":""}],[{"start":713,"text":"“There are about 300,000 [farms] that manage the food-producing land . . . and then you have this huge tail of farmers and they are often protesting because their farms are small and they don’t have much income,” he says."}],[{"start":724.9,"text":"In many ways, the argument is already being overtaken by events."}],[{"start":729.4,"text":"Smallholders are going out of business. The number of farms in the EU dropped from 14.4mn in 2005 to 8.8mn in 2023 while the amount of farmland remained the same. Almost 90 per cent of the fall in farm numbers was made up of those that were less than five hectares."}],[{"start":748,"text":"“In the last 10 years the amount of cattle that have gone out of this country [and] farmers have gotten out of farming because it was so bad,” says O’Sullivan. "}],[{"start":757.35,"text":"The current moment “raises interesting questions about whether family farming is the way to continue the structure in the future”, says Matthews, “not only when farmers have to raise their crops but have to be accountants, they have to be vets and environmentalists and work drones and all this stuff. To expect anyone to be even medium level in all these skills is a little too much.” "}],[{"start":null,"text":""}],[{"start":779.1,"text":"As many family farmers are selling up, institutional investors are moving in. Spain and Portugal, which already supply a large share of Europe’s fruit, vegetables and olive oil, have become a focal point, where many see an opportunity to expand and modernise farming. "}],[{"start":796.2,"text":"Data from global real estate adviser CBRE shows more than €4.2bn was invested in Iberian agribusiness between 2022 and 2024, with institutional investors accounting for roughly half of that total. "}],[{"start":810.25,"text":"“Until 10-15 years ago, the agricultural asset class wasn’t a prime consideration in investors’ portfolios,” says Javier Uribarren, partner at Trifolium Farms, which acquires and manages agricultural land on behalf of institutional investors across Iberia, focusing on permanent crops such as olives, almonds and citrus."}],[{"start":834.45,"text":"Increasingly, however, it has become more attractive as “an inflation hedge” and as “an asset that is uncorrelated from others” in a typical portfolio, he says. "}],[{"start":845.3000000000001,"text":"The attraction is not just the land itself, but how the sector is changing. “There’s a natural consolidation of a sector that was very much driven by family ownership and that is the succession of family ownership into institutional investors, private equity, pension funds etc,” he says, explaining that farms are often too small to compete and in many cases there is no one to take them over. "}],[{"start":868.7500000000001,"text":"Investors are betting that bigger farms work better. “Everything that we do is mechanised,” Uribarren says. “Unless you have the necessary scale . . . it’s not profitable.” Larger operations can invest in irrigation, new planting systems and technology that smaller farms cannot afford. "}],[{"start":886.7000000000002,"text":"This will make it easier for the EU to compete with more industrialised producers such as Brazil or Australia, where agriculture operates at greater scale and with fewer subsidies. But Europe’s farmers are unlikely to go down without a manure-slinging fight first. "}],[{"start":902.7000000000002,"text":"“We’re becoming an endangered species,” says O’Sullivan. “They’re chipping away at us.”"}],[{"start":907.7000000000002,"text":"Data visualisation by Janina Conboye"}],[{"start":916.0000000000001,"text":""}]],"url":"https://audio.ftcn.net.cn/album/a_1778383525_7025.mp3"}