UNIT 9: European Green Deal and Agriculture

European Green Deal, approved in 2020, is a set of policy initiatives with the aim of making Europe the first climate-neutral continent by 2050. This will require deep and broad changes in all sectors of society and economy, and agriculture will be among the sectors in the frontline.

EU’s Farm to Fork Strategy, also approved in 2020, is one of key strategies of European Green Deal, with the aim of creating socially, environmentally, and economically sustainable food system, resilient to any future crisis.

While the EU agriculture is the only major system in the world which has reduced its greenhouse gas emissions (for 20 percent since 1990), it remains one of the main drivers of climate change and environmental degradation, responsible for 10 percent of the EU greenhouse gas emissions.

At the same time, agricultural workers already directly feel consequences of hydrogeological instability, land degradation and soil erosion on their working conditions.

Climate change has already increased risks to workers’ health, through increased exposure to extreme temperatures and air pollution, increased risks of heat exhaustion, dehydration, and heat-related illnesses.

It has also led to increased need for flexibility and adaptability, as organisation of work and use of technology need to quickly adapt, increasing the need for additional training of workers.

Agriculture is one of sectors with high share of so called “brown jobs”, i.e., jobs which concern highly polluting activities, and require significant structural changes in order to make them climate neutral.

There is also a high share of low and medium skills jobs, with high routine content. They are very likely to be affected by automation (digitalisation), which often comes hand in hand with green transition.

Climate transition, including both adaptation to climate change and design and implementation of policies aimed to mitigate it, needs to be socially fair.

This means that the EU and the member stated need to adopt measures and provide adequate financial resources for protecting the workers’ whose jobs will disappear or significantly change in the process.

Without such measures, climate change and climate policies can have strong regressive distributional effects – those who are already most vulnerable, including workers on precarious jobs and with low wages, could pay the highest price. Therefore, social fairness of climate transition requires including the workers in design and implementation of its policies and measures, including on the level of individual companies.