Tuesday 19 August 2014

They own land! Give them money!

From City AM:

Brussels set to make payouts for farmers hit by Putin’s sanctions

EUROZONE fruit and vegetable farmers hit by the Russian govern­ment’s food sanctions are set for a payout, with Brussels pledging €125m (£99.9m) in compensation to those affected yesterday.

The action is designed to help prop up food prices in the single market. Dacian Ciolos, the EU’s agriculture commissioner, said that the action was meant to “reduce overall supply of a number of fruit and vegetable products” so that there would not be too much downwards pressure on prices.

9 comments:

Lola said...

aaaarrrrggghhhh!!!!!!

View from the Solent said...

So we are paying money through our taxes to ensure that we pay more for our fruit and veg.
Hempen rope is far too luxurious for Dacian Ciolos and his ilk.

Physiocrat said...

They've got land, give them money.

Mark Wadsworth said...

VFTS, Phys, yes, that is how it works :-)

Ian Hills said...

It seems to me that the EU is just a big business cartel.

benj said...

Lower prices are a bad thing. Where have I heard that before?

Kj said...

BJ: to be fair, the "lower prices is bad" idea was originally invented by the landownerists, but adopted by keynesians and other people of good intentions like it was their own baby...

Mark Wadsworth said...

IH, by and large, yes. That's the main reason I don't like the EU.

BJ, well spotted.

Kj, I think "keynesians" might say that they want to keep demand high or wages high, but do they want to keep specific prices high?

DBC Reed said...

You are missing the political dimension that these people are being compensated for losing money on the not very intelligent policy of riling Putin by pushing up on his borders.You would have thought the Not Very Intelligent class would have tried to develop free market trade (energy one way; fruit and veg the other)but they're hot for this new idea instead:cold war. Pretty expensive last time.