Promoting healthy and sustainable diets in the EU (own-initiative opinion) - Related Opinions

The Commission's initiative follows one of the recommendations of the Agricultural Markets Task Force that the EU should legislate in the areas of UTPs for agricultural products, and responds to some of the conclusions of the 2016 EESC opinion on "A fairer food supply chain".

In this exploratory opinion, prepared at the request of the European Commission, the EESC provides its contribution to the ongoing reflection on the modernisation and simplification of the CAP post 2020.  A reshaped CAP must retain the positive aspects of the current policy and adopt new measures to deal with the new challenges which include societal demands for the delivery of public goods, the EU commitments under the United Nations SDGs, climate change commitments under the COP21, bilateral trade deals and market volatility. A reshaped CAP must also get the correct balance between the needs of the consumer, taxpayers and producers.

In the past few years, civil society has been increasingly concerned about the environmental and social impact of food production and consumption. At the request of the Dutch EU Presidency, the EESC is preparing an exploratory opinion on how to achieve sustainable food systems in a resource-constrained world. The opinion takes a holistic and comprehensive approach, looking at the interdependence of food production and consumption as well as fostering inter-sectoral cooperation.