Issues of future agricultural policy in the European Common Market

The increase of productivity required to keep agricultural income development in line with that of the other sectors has led to an increase of agricultural production in all EEC countries. Although production has increased at a faster rate than consumption, none of the member countries has made an effort to adapt the growth of production to the growth of consumption. Depending on the structural situation, the orientation of their production and the input-output relationships, there is a variation in the ways in which productivity can be increased between various member countries, and this affects also the extent and the direction of the increase of production. This leads to a divergence of interests with respect to the levels of agricultural product prices which tends to increase with the enlargement of the Community and makes it difficult to reach a consensus on this issue. To overcome this difficulty it seems necessary to define objective criteria by establishing to ‘what farms’ and for ‘what regions’ the income goals which are to be achieved by the income and price policy should apply. The article contains an analysis of the criteria for a rational income and price policy under EEC conditions and of the merits of a substitution of direct income payment for price supports.