During the EP plenary that took place in February, the directly elected legislative body adopted a resolution on the Commission’s recent communication on fertilisers addressing the shortage and soaring prices mainly caused by EU’s dependence to third countries, especially Russia.
After extensive debate, MEPs passed the non-legislative resolution firstly drafted by the AGRI committee, highlighting the need for the bloc to wean itself off fertilising products and raw materials imports. Some of the members called for the development of a long-term fertilisers strategy, while others have focused more on additional support to industry and farmers in the short term. From the adopted text, it emerges that the EU should turn the attention to organic based fertilisers including digestate, compost and manure. The use of compost has been explicitly encouraged in the text, with point 55 underlining its beneficial effects on soil health and fertilisation together with its contribution to fight drought. In this sense, the EP is also pushing for a long-term EU soil nutrient strategy by June 2023 to foster nutrient recycling. Finally, MEPs requested the Commission to present an impact assessment, comprehensively analysing the supply of nutrients to EU farming from mineral, organo-mineral and organic fertilisers.
The resolution is not binding, still it urges Member States to take appropriate action on this timely and sensitive topic. To have a look at the full adopted text click here.