Uruguay Round proposal on agriculture

On the 4 November 1990, the European Commission approved a major proposal from Mr Ray Mac Sharry, Commissioner responsible for Agriculture and Rural Development, defining the Community's offer to reduce agricultural support and protection in the context of the Uruguay Round. The Commission's proposal would be discussed by the Council next week. The Community, along with the other participants in the negotiations, has agreed to submit its offer in Geneva by 15 October.

The Commission's proposal formulated the Community's global approach to reductions in support and protection, outlined in its submission to the GATT in December 1989, as well as the ideas put forward by Mr Mac Sharry at the Quint Meeting of Agriculture Ministers in Ireland in July. The proposal was also in line with the declaration adopted at the July Summit of Industrialized Countries in Houston which recognized that variations among countries in the mechanisms of agricultural support reflect differences in the social and economic conditions of farming and the need for a common instrument to measure support.