CDU on agriculture

The CDU wants to amend state law to keep farmland available for food production. Anyone taking over a farm is to receive a flat-rate bonus, and agricultural investment is to get more support.

Fields and meadows should stay in use for growing food. Young people should get money when they take over a farm. The state should give farmers more money for investments. Modern technology should help in the fields.

The law to be amended is the state's agriculture and land management act. Higher funding caps and more money in the state budget are planned for investments. Farms run by people under 40 are to receive more targeted support. Farmers in border regions should no longer face competitive disadvantages. Digitalization, sensors, AI and robotics are meant to raise yields and efficiency and reduce red tape.

The CDU wants to link nature conservation and farming more closely while easing restrictions, for example by reforming the ban on plowing up grassland. Instead of new rigid protected zones, it relies on regional solutions, subsidies and cooperation.

The CDU wants nature protection and farming to work together. Farmers should decide more for themselves. The ban on turning meadows into fields should change. The CDU does not want new strict protected zones. It prefers to pay farmers for protecting nature.

The platform trusts farms to follow good professional practice and wants to create new models of cooperation. Both fields should also work together again within the administration. The cultivated landscape is to be preserved through care and use, and property rights are explicitly respected. The FAKT funding program, the landscape management guideline and the orchard meadow plan will continue, the latter with more money. The goals of the Biodiversity Strengthening Act and a statewide habitat network are to be implemented, with simpler procedures and a review of the cost of expert reports. Compensation measures under the Ökokonto (eco-account) ordinance are to become more flexible.

The CDU backs regional food production, whether organic or conventional. The state's food security is to be written into the state constitution as a state objective, and livestock farming in the state is to be supported.

The CDU wants more food from the region. That goes for organic food and other food. Cafeterias and schools should use more of it. Food security should be written into the state constitution. Farmers should have less paperwork.

The organic model regions are to become "VON DAHEIM" ("from home") regions, and "VON DAHEIM" is to become a single state brand. Public cafeterias and all-day school meals are to use more regional products. Food emergency preparedness will be expanded, farm bureaucracy cut and a workable system for the EU's agricultural policy sought from 2027. The CDU commits to livestock farming and wants to support it with investment, quick permits and grandfathering for existing barns. The platform also plans nutrition education in daycare centers and schools and support for winegrowing, especially on steep slopes.