The Common Agricultural Policy and the Increased Competitiveness of Spanish Regional Agriculture

Abstract

The cycle of the Common Agricultural Policy reforms begun in 1992 and that finished, for the time being, in 2013, profoundly transformed the agricultural framework of the EU. Taken as a whole, the process consisted of the progressive, partial and asymmetric liberalization of European agriculture, since much more emphasis was placed on dismantling intervention mechanisms than on aiding the restructuring, modernization and adaptation to a more competitive environment. In this context, and with an increasingly more open commercial policy, the States and the regions are obliged to design strategies to increase their competitiveness and innovation within the framework of the current Common Agricultural Policy (2014-2020). This is even more important for the regions most affected by the reforms. Under this argument, this paper reveals the principal qualitative and quantitative unknowns of the regional agricultural policy in Spain after the application of the Health Check in 2008, with special emphasis on the evolution of the Axis 1 of Rural Development.