Barry Cowen expresses regret over his dismissal from the Agriculture Minister position six years ago, acknowledging that both he and his party have learned valuable lessons from that experience.
Advocate General Juliane Kokott stated that Ireland may only legally approve increased nitrogen limits for farms after scientifically determining that water quality objectives will not be prejudiced.
The European Commission will "proceed with [the] provisional application" of the Mercosur trade deal with Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay, the commission's chief Ursula von der Leyen announced on Friday. The deal was signed in January after over 25 years of negotiations, despite opposition from some European farmers.
Hundreds of tractors rolled into Paris early on Tuesday morning as French farmers protest against the trade deal the European Union has struck with four South American countries. The long-delayed trade pact with the Mercosur bloc was approved by the EU last week and is due to be signed on Saturday. Farmers in France and several other countries fear being undercut by an influx of cheap beef and other products from South America.
The environmental impacts of meat consumption could be rapidly and cheaply reduced if governments applied full VAT on products such as beef, pork, lamb and chicken, a study has shown. Depending on how the additional tax revenues were redistributed, such a change could cost households as little as 26 (23) a year, while cutting ecological destruction by between 3% and 6%, the paper found.
After nearly two decades of negotiations, India and the European Union announced Tuesday they have reached a free trade agreement to deepen economic and strategic ties. The accord, which the EU chief described as the "mother of all deals," could affect as many as 2 billion people. The deal between two of the world's biggest markets comes as Washington targets both India and the EU with steep import tariffs, disrupting established trade flows and pushing major economies to seek alternate partnerships.
Australia and the EU are on the brink of striking a long sought after free trade agreement, with both sides talking up significant progress during talks in Brussels overnight. Ahead of a planned visit to Australia by European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen, due within months, a joint statement issued after the latest talks attended by the trade minister, Don Farrell, signalled major progress. The two sides said they had been able to converge on key differences which have dogged the deal for years.
Campaigners from the Climate Action Network, a pan-European group of NGOs, said European industry was under real pressure from high energy prices, ageing assets, global overcapacity and delayed investments, but these issues could not be solved by watering down climate and environmental policies. Deregulation is not an industrial strategy, the group wrote in an open letter, which argued that the problems facing energy-intensive industries, including steel, cement and chemicals, were driven by prices of fossil fuel-derived energy and global market dynamics, rather than environmental regulation.
To coincide with this event, the Heinrich Boll Foundation, which has close ties to the Green Party, has published its "Corporate Atlas 2026." The study states: In Germany, more and more small and medium-sized farms are dying out. One reason is that the domestic supply chains for milk, meat and vegetables are dominated by just four large retail chains that dictate prices and squeeze farmers out of business.
My career as an agronomist required me to take scientific research and apply that knowledge, to assist farmers by helping them solve problems and increase their farms profitability. The ag industry relies on research to continue to solve the ever-changing problems that farmers face. Today my farm business employs management practices that have come directly from the Lacombe Research and Development Centre, this has improved my farms resilience and profitability.