I’ve been at the EBD post-Council debriefing in Berlin today (Chatham House rules), trying to get a wider and a more German perspective on the ongoing reforms of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) and the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP). Common Agricultural Policy When watching the beginning of yesterday’s Council debate on the greening of the [...]
Yesterday, the EU Council on Fisheries showed no urge to push for an environmentally sustainable fisheries policy (cf. my life blogging). Today, the EU Council on Agriculture showed no interest in greening the Union’s agriculture. I’m not what one might call a radical environmentalist. In fact, I have more hope in citizens changing their behaviour [...]
I study information flows in EU policy-making, and thus am glad about a recent EU Court of Auditors Special Report evaluating an EU Commission information system I haven’t come across: The Common RELEX Information System (CRIS). As far as I understood, this system is basically a management and control system for the planning and operational execution [...]
Live blogging of the morning session of the EU Council meeting on Fisheries of 14 May 2012 (background here). May contain mistakes and miss certain aspects! 12:50 END OF LIVE BLOGGING 12:45 Danish Presidency: It is difficult to conclude after this discussions. I have heard the mentioning of the socio-economic dimension. But we have a [...]
Today, the EU Council holds its third orientation debate on the reform of the EU’s Common Fisheries Policy (Council background note). That’s the shiny surface of general ideas and positions staged for the public and live streamed on the internet (from ~11/11.15 am). Tomorrow, the Council’s Working Party* on “Internal and External Fisheries Policy” meets, and [...]
The EU Council just published “The European Union mid-term priorities at the United Nations” (Update: slightly revised version) for “public diplomacy use”. I suppose that this means that there is a second document “for secret diplomacy use”. And indeed, reading through the “priorities” looks like a long shopping list of diplomatic blabla – whether it’s [...]
From the EU Commission meeting of 18 April 2012: Barroso “asked each Commissioner to travel to Greece to support the communication actions there and demonstrate visibly not just the Commission’s support for the Greek people but everything it had done to lay the groundwork for inclusive growth and sustainable development in Europe.” This request closed the [...]
I’ve already blogged about next week’s EU Council meeting with regard to the fisheries issues. However, the Council also deals with what is by far the largest chunk of the EU budget, the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), and its reform. For next week’s session, the Danish Council Presidency has prepared a questionnaire to structure the [...]
The sad thing about European media is that there’s probably no show that could make fun of elections in Europe than the US-based “The Daily Show“. The good thing is that it does manage to make decent fun of European politics. Watch: The Daily Show with Jon Stewart: International House of Pander-cakes – Greece & France [...]
If I will die at the age of 75, I will have waited ~1% of my life for the EU Commission to come up with a decision regarding a 21-page document. I’ve blogged about the story in the past, but here’s a short version of this story supplemented by how it ended today. At the end [...]