Brussels, Jan. 26, 2021 (Lusa) - Portugal's minister of agriculture, Maria do Céu Antunes, on Tuesday told a committee of the European Parliament that she believed a political solution would be found to avoid cuts in European Union spending on agriculture in the bloc's outermost regions, such as the Azores and Madeira in Portugal, after 2022.

"I believe we will find a political solution," Antunes said in response to a question from Álvaro Amaro, a member elected for Portugal's Socialist Democratic Party (PSD) on cutting POSEI (Programme of options specifically relating to remoteness and insularity) funds coming under the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) for the period from 2021 to 2027.

“We want to work towards [the overall sum] being maintained after 2023," said the minister, stressing that the Council of the EU had called for the money for the outermost regions to be maintained, and that the European Commission had put the conditions in place for "the budget to be maintained in the transition period" until the new CAP kicks in, that is until the end of 2022.

"Agricultural activity is essential in many of the outermost regions," she added, in the debate in the parliament's agriculture committee on the priorities for the sector of Portugal's presidency of the EU Council.

Portugal holds the rotating presidency of the Council of the EU in the first half of this year.

The POSEI programme supports the outermost regions of the EU, which face particular challenges due to their remoteness, insular nature, small size, difficult topography or climate. It also helps support regions that are economically dependent on only a few products.

GI/ARO // ARO.

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