EU Parliament and Council seal last-minute deal to extend Ukraine’s trade benefits. EU lawmakers reached on Monday a hard-fought deal on the renewal of trade liberalisation measures with Kyiv, after member states agreed to reinforce some safeguards against market distortions. Kyiv’s Trade Minister Taras Kachka told Euractiv that “any form” of trade liberalisation was a relief for the Ukrainian economy, but regretted the additional limitations. NGOs warn of ‘poisoned gift’ for farmers as MEPs vote to fast-track easing green rules. As the Parliament voted on Thursday to fast-track the easing of some environmental requirements in the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), NGOs and consumer organisations have slammed the measures and accused the EU institutions of disregarding democratic principles. Parliament weakens EU countries’ obligations under EU soil legislation. MEPs approved on Wednesday (10 April) their position on the EU’s first soil law. The Parliament endorsed the Commission’s ambition to achieve healthy EU soils by 2050 and backed provisions forcing member states to monitor the state of all their soils. On the same day, MEPs voted to improve consumer information on certain ‘breakfast’ foods. The Parliament approved marketing standards to curb fraud in honey, promote higher fruit content in jams, and set new categories for reduced-sugar fruit juices. Food retail sector shows early signs of recovery after years of tight spending. After challenging market conditions in 2023 led to a drop in grocery sales, an analysis published by McKinsey on Wednesday shows that consumer confidence is returning. The Commission starts setting up the EU agri-food chain observatory. As part of the pledge to strengthen farmers’ position in the food chain, the EU executive is setting up an observatory that will look at production costs, margins and trading practices. EU executive shields the proposal on gene-edited plants from French food safety agency criticism. The Commission vindicated the scientific robustness of its proposal on plants’ gene editing at a hearing before the Parliament’s environment committee on Tuesday, countering the critical remarks of French food agency Anses. French Council of State again suspends national ban on meat names for plant products. The French top administrative court on Wednesday stopped a government decree banning the names of meat for plant-based products, such as ‘veggie sausage’ or ‘burger’, pending the decision by the European Court of Justice (ECJ). Portugal becomes the eighth European country to adopt food traffic-light labelling system Nutriscore. Lisbon adopted on April 5 the front-of-pack labelling Nutriscore after the European Commission failed to unveil a proposal for an EU-wide model. The Canary Islands government questions sustainability of EU’s first octopus farm project. The regional government requested an in-depth impact study from the company behind the project to build Europe’s first-ever octopus farm, due to uncertainties over environmental consequences. [Edited by Zoran Radosavljevic] |