The first national workshop in Israel in the frame of the second phase of the ENPARD South Support Programme took place in Tel Aviv from the 17th to the 19th of May 2016. The general objective of the seminar was to discuss about a possible reform of the Israeli farmers support policy drawing on the experiences of the CAP and its evolution which could be useful for Israel. 

In the wake of a series of protests and demonstrations due to public concern about increasing costs of living (prices of food, housing, etc..), the Israeli government decided to identify and review government policies conducive to high prices. The national farmers’ support policy was identified as one of those, because it is presently relying on tariffs imposed on agricultural imports and on supply management tools such as milk quotas. The intention of the Israeli government was to explore possibilities of replacing price support policy by other income support measures such as direct payments to farmers. 

During the first day of the mission, a field tour was organised by the Israeli Ministry of Agriculture  to acquaint the experts with the realities of Israeli agriculture. In addition to providing interesting insight into the diversity and commonalities within Israeli agriculture, the visit was the occasion for visited farmers to frankly express their point of view on the prospects of reform of the agricultural support policy and explain their difficulties and expectations. 

Following the field tour, a workshop of one day and half was organised during which  presentations were given by Israeli officials and by five EU experts, each specialised on different aspects of the evolution of the CAP and farmers’ support, followed by discussions  tackling the different aspects of the future reform. The presentations were organised in five sessions, with, for each session, an introductory presentation by an Israeli official from the Ministry of Agriculture followed by a presentation of an EU expert on the selected topics. The five selected topics were: 

•    Overall approaches of farmers support policy as illustrated by the CAP and its evolution;

•    Direct payments and agri-environmental subsidies; 

•    Reduction of indirect support for vegetables and fruits and alternative support instruments;

•    Reform of the dairy sector support; 

•    Revenue insurance and income safety nets.

The presentations by the Israeli officers and by EU experts provided valuable material for in-depth discussions and exchanges among officials from the Ministry of Finance, academics from Israeli universities, WTO representatives and EU delegation. In total, about 50 people participated in the workshop. The major conclusions coming from those exchanges are the following:

•    The shift to generalised direct payments requires a careful consideration of the basis on which such payments will be calculated, of the level of decoupling from production, of the nature of the public goods which have to be produced as a condition to receive them, and of potential regional disparities;

•    In the case of fruits and vegetables, CAP support has been of a specific kind, linked to producers’ organisations (POs). The major advantage of supporting POs and their aggregation is to strengthen the bargaining power of farmers in value chains that otherwise would be very unbalanced to the advantage of wholesalers or retailers;

•    For the Israeli dairy sector, alternatives to quotas are considered, such as direct payments, financial instruments, voluntary schemes to reduce production, long term forward pricing, income insurance, etc.. The EU experience shows that in a situation of price volatility, direct payments might not suffice to stabilise farmers’ income;

•    There is a growing interest and demand for risk management tools in Israel, linked to the liberalisation of the agricultural sector, and associated growing capital investment in farm operations. 

During the last half-day, a public round table with Israeli stakeholders was held to debate with participants on the future reform of agricultural support and especially on the direct payments. 

The public roundtable gathered around 100 participants in the Ministry of Agriculture, among which farmers and farmers’ organisations were strongly represented. After a summarized presentation by each of the EU experts, a debate was organised. The opportunity of such a round table proved extremely useful indeed to collect inputs from the stakeholders. 

Farmers’ representatives, backed by ordinary members in the room expressed worries about the reform and the abolition of price support. They are concerned about the magnitude and duration of the direct support. 

Following this three-day seminar, the Ministry of agriculture, in coordination with the ENPARD South Support Programme team, decided to address others factors contributing to high consumer prices. Thus, the next workshop which will be held in Tel Aviv on September 13th and 14h will raise the issue of unfair trading practices in the fresh fruits and vegetables sector. A work plan was also later established with the ENPARD focal point, with two more technical workshops to be held before May 2017, on the following issues:

1.    Support to fruits and vegetables growers
2.    Agri-environmental subsidies