Cook goes CAP in hand to EU Union hopefuls

Negotiations to extend membership of the European Union to five former Soviet bloc countries of Central and Eastern Europe will open on 31 March under Britain's chairmanship of the EU, the Foreign Secretary, Robin Cook, announced yesterday. In Warsaw on the final leg of a three- nation visit to prepare the ground, Mr Cook committed Britain to promoting a radical shake-up of the EU's hugely expensive and inefficient farm policy. The CAP would cause food prices in Poland and the other applicant states to spiral if applied in its present form, he warned.

"The European Union's agricultural policy has major implications for Central Europe ... Why should the Polish shopping basket cost more just because Poland has joined the European Union?"Poland's economy is heavily farm dependent, with more than a quarter of the workforce is employed on the land, but Mr Cook said the CAP must made to respond to the needs of farmers in Eastern Europe as well as those in the existing member-states. If Central European agriculture was to develop, the CAP would have to shift from subsidies for production to direct support for rural communities.