European Agriculture Commissioner Dacian Ciolos said yesterday he was aware of Malta’s particular farming needs and was committed to address them in the review of the Common Agricultural Policy.

“Two specific schemes dealing with young farmers (most Maltese farmers are over 55) and with famers with small tracts of land need to be adapted for Malta. We are aware of this. We have to find specific solutions for Malta and we will find them,” he said.

The challenge is to draw up a common policy for 27 countries rather than for 12 as it was before when the policy was first formulated. “But for the European Commission, farming in Malta is as important as farming in Germany, France, the Netherlands or any other member state,” he said.

He was speaking to journalists after a visit to a cow farm in San Ġwann during a whirlwind day of meetings in which he had the chance to see first-hand how things work in Malta and Gozo. Earlier in the day he visited a pig farm in Żebbuġ.

Mr Ciolos said the redesigned CAP, unveiled by the European Commission last week, was one that had to take into account the new realities and the diversity of farming across Europe.

“The challenge is to strike a balance between economic competitiveness and ecological competiveness whereby we have a Europe that is fertile and not just a desert. We have to combine both aspects for all Europe with more innovation and more organisation.”

Rural Affairs Minister George Pullicino highlighted Malta’s difficulties. “We will be making our submissions and hope we will get the adjustments we need as well as the flexibility we require to address our particular needs,” he said.

On the size of Malta’s farming land, Mr Pullicino pointed out that 76 per cent of farmers had less than two hectares of land and 51 per cent had less than one hectare.

He argued that every cent invested in farming was a direct investment in the country’s environment.

Mr Ciolos stressed the need for farmers in Malta to invest in modernising their facilities. He said the new CAP would place more emphasis on support for the development of short supply chains between producers and consumers and quality products.

The cow farm he visited, owned by brothers Brian and Charles Vella, received EU funds to invest in the first automated dairy management system in Malta, including robotic milking. The farm has 50 cows that produce an average of 1,400 litres of milk a day.

The robotic milking system is equipped with an identification mechanism that measures the activity of each animal and its health. Cows are enticed to enter the automated milking system with food and it is then the robot which decides, based on the information it would have on that animal, whether it is time for that cow to be milked.

Sign up to our free newsletters

Get the best updates straight to your inbox:
Please select at least one mailing list.

You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails. We use Mailchimp as our marketing platform. By subscribing, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing.