Andersson, Färm, Hedkvist Petersen, Karlsson, Sandberg-Fries and Theorin (PSE), in writing. – (SV) We chose to vote against all proposed amendments to the Commission proposal and against the report as a whole.

We would like to see modern European agriculture in line with the common agricultural policy reforms. We consider the Commission proposal to be a step toward reaching the goals relating to the Union’s agricultural policy.

We support a radical reform of agricultural policy with the decoupling of agricultural aid as the main goal. We therefore support the Commission proposal.

To support the wording of the report would be to take a large step backwards in the work to reform European agriculture since Parliament’s wording promotes continued direct aid and production-linked aid to far too great an extent.

The aim of the EU’s agricultural policy is to grant farmers greater freedom to produce what the market demands, which would lead to production being adapted to the consumer. This is particularly important from an international perspective in order not to render competition on the European market more difficult for the developing countries with their agricultural products. For us, these are important principles that must be taken into consideration in the Union’s agricultural policy, particularly in relation to cotton and tobacco.