THE UK CONTINUES TO SUBSIDISE FRENCH FARMERS
France receives 2.5 times as much as UK from EU Agricultural budget
© L'Elysée
Another exclusive, factual report from the Brexit Facts4EU.Org team
The French still go ‘CAP in hand’ to the EU for subsidies after 61 years of EEC/EU membership.
Here, Brexit Facts4EU.Org looks at one aspect of the amazing story of how the third-richest EU economy has played the EU benefits system for decades and got away with it, taking billions per year in subsidies for its inefficient farming sector.
The UK’s economy is slightly larger than that of France, but its population is smaller. The latest population stats for 2018 from Eurostat show 65.8 million for the UK and 67.0 million for France. One significant area of difference is that France still retains a sizeable rural economy, subsidised by the French State and particularly by those few EU countries such as the UK who are net contributors.
For decades France has fiercely protected one of the first features of what was originally the EEC or ‘Common Market’ – that of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). It has done so because it is by far the biggest beneficiary of what are effectively subsidies for running an inefficient agricultural sector.
Look at how much French farmers receive
Brexit Facts4EU.Org Summary
© Brexit Facts4EU.Org 2019
- Over the past 10 years the EU has been spending over 40% of its budget on the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP)
- In 2017 alone, the EU spent €59 billion on the CAP
- France received almost €10.0 billion of this
- That is an enormous sum of money – and this was only in one year
Incredibly, rich France received over one-sixth of the EU's entire Common Agricultural Policy subsidies in 2017, with a grand total of €9,671,247,000 (9.7 billion) Euros.
This made it the recipient of by far the biggest EU subsidy. With the UK receiving just €3.9 billion Euros, this means:
France receives over 2.5 times more rural and agricultural payments from the EU than the UK
Observations
Brexit Facts4EU.Org deals in the reality of the EU – including the way the EU gets money from the few net contributor member states such as the UK, and the way it spends that money. We look at the way decisions are made and at the nature of those decisions.
In short, we see the EU for what it really is – red in tooth and claw, to use an analogy from nature.
By contrast, we see, hear and read Remainer politicians and commentators in the UK on a daily basis, talking about what they think the EU is and does. They present a happy valley where ‘all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds’, as the French philosopher Voltaire had it. Alas, they are all sadly deluded.
“Voters didn’t know what they were voting for” – Remainer MPs certainly didn’t and don’t
Unfortunately, the ignorance of Remainer MPs doesn’t stop them lecturing the British people as if they actually knew what they were talking about. Day after day we produce solid evidence such as that above, showing that the EU is profoundly dysfunctional, undemocratic, warped in its thinking, and unrepresentative of the peoples of the 28 EU countries.
All of the data we researched to produce this article and the article yesterday came from the EU itself. It’s up-to-date – or as up-to-date as the EU ever is. Remainer MPs can’t simply dismiss information like this. They have to face it, and then tell the British people why they still think that the voters got it wrong.
Poor France?
What justification can you think of, for why France should receive by far the largest agricultural and rural subsidies in the EU? Come to that, what justification can you think of for any agricultural subsidies to be collected and distributed by the EU at all?
If countries like France want to subsidise their agriculture and rural economies, (something which the British government will do post-Brexit), let them do it themselves.
Finally, the work involved in producing real information like that above is considerable.
Please help us to keep going, with a donation today.
[ Sources: European Commission, Directorate General for Agriculture and Rural Development | ONS ]
18 Feb 2019
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