CDU on agriculture

The CDU wants to continue the Zukunftsdialog Landwirtschaft (dialogue on the future of farming) and turn its results into concrete measures. The aim is an agriculture shaped by family farms, with crop and livestock farming, that can plan for the long term.

The CDU wants to keep talking with farmers about the future. The talks should lead to real measures. Family farms should stay. Farmers should be able to plan far ahead.

The program stresses planning certainty for farms and wants measures developed jointly and on a scientific basis. Farms should be free to choose between conventional and organic, full-time and part-time operation. Vocational schools are to teach organic and conventional farming in shared classes. The CDU wants to examine whether farmers, and not only the Stiftung Naturschutz (state nature conservation foundation), can be contracted for landscape management. Land is to keep its status as arable land even when used differently for a time, and tree nurseries are to receive continued support.

The CDU wants to relaunch the former agricultural marketing body CMA and push for a national food agency that promotes regional products at home and abroad. In addition, every schoolchild in the state is to visit a farm once.

The CDU wants more advertising for local food. A new agency should do this. People should value farmers' work more. Every schoolchild should visit a farm once.

The agency is to promote regional products, current standards and the local way of producing food. According to the program, this should raise appreciation for food and farming. The project "Schulklassen auf dem Bauernhof" (school classes on the farm) is to be continued and expanded. The Chamber of Agriculture is to set up an advisory service for start-ups working on digitalization and regional marketing in rural areas.

The CDU wants to achieve animal welfare, climate protection, biodiversity and water protection in farming through funding programs rather than legal requirements. It justifies this with the competitiveness of farms. Federal and EU standards are not to be tightened at the state level.

The CDU does not want to burden farmers with new rules. There should be funding for protecting nature and animals. The state should not make federal and EU rules stricter. This should help farms stay competitive.

According to the program, ecology and competitiveness should not rule each other out, and food production in the state should remain secure. Imported farm products are to meet the same standards as domestic ones. The agricultural administration is to be modernized and digitalized to simplify application and inspection procedures and cut red tape. The work of the Allianz für Gewässerschutz (alliance for water protection) is to continue, and insect protection is to be pursued together with farmers.

The CDU wants to found a competence center that pools scientific knowledge on climate-efficient agriculture and helps farms cut their greenhouse gas emissions. It also promotes digital methods in field and barn and backs a carbon border adjustment for imports.

The CDU wants to found a new center for farming and climate. Experts will work together there. They will help farmers emit fewer harmful gases. Digital technology should help too.

According to the program, agriculture, environmental protection, energy production and climate protection should be considered together. The CDU promotes precision farming and smart farming, meaning digital technology that applies seed, fertilizer, crop protection and feed exactly as needed. This technology is also meant to give consumers more transparency. A border adjustment is intended to keep imports from undercutting climate policy and putting domestic farms at a disadvantage.

The CDU wants farms to be able to earn money through environmental and climate protection. It welcomes the eco-schemes in EU agricultural policy and supports industry-backed payment systems. The required greening of agriculture is to become easier for farms to carry out.

Farmers should be able to earn money by protecting nature. The CDU likes the EU's new eco-schemes. These are payments for voluntary environmental work. Businesses should also pay farmers for this.

The program expects EU direct payments to be phased out in an orderly way over the long term. The EU's Green Deal and Farm to Fork strategies are to be considered together with agricultural policy and backed by agri-environment programs. The agri-environment and climate measures of the second pillar, the EU's rural development funding, are to form an attractive and coordinated offer.

The CDU wants to make pasture-based livestock farming more attractive by simplifying rules and launching funding programs. Farmers are to receive money for wolf-proof fences. Because of crop damage from wild geese, the party considers goose management including hunting necessary.

Keeping animals on pasture should get easier. The CDU wants to cut rules and provide money. Farmers should get help with fences against wolves. Wild geese eat fields bare. So hunting geese should be allowed.

Obstacles from fencing rules and burdensome livestock reporting are to be reduced. Financial help for wolf-proof fences is to cover both putting them up and taking them down. Goose management is to be based on population size, because according to the program harvests on forage farms sometimes fail entirely. The CDU also announces a plan to stop the further spread of ragwort (Jakobskreuzkraut).

The CDU wants to preserve commercial fishing in Schleswig-Holstein despite sharply reduced EU catch quotas. Decommissioning payments and EU funds are to be used so that the remaining businesses survive. Shrimp fishing is not to face further no-take zones in the Wadden Sea.

The CDU wants fishing to continue in the state. The EU allows far less cod and herring fishing. So fishers should get help. There should be no new closed zones for shrimp fishers in the Wadden Sea.

The program calls for new concepts for commercial fishing and for keeping fishing infrastructure in place. Money from the European fund EMFAF is to be targeted, for example at selective gear that avoids unwanted bycatch. Consumers are to be made more aware of sustainable fishing in order to support family-run coastal fishing. Cormorant management is to be improved and expanded together with fishers, and pond farming is to get help in dealing with otters. Fishers are to be included in the dialogue on all projects.

The CDU wants to expand aquaculture facilities and support their further development because they could increasingly meet demand for fish. Regulatory hurdles for environmentally friendly recirculating systems are to be lowered. The environment must not be significantly harmed in the process.

The CDU wants more fish farming in facilities. These are called aquaculture. They should partly replace fishing at sea. There should be fewer rules for eco-friendly facilities.

The program treats aquaculture as a sustainable alternative to deep-sea fishing. Relief is planned for recirculating systems, meaning facilities that reuse their water. The CDU's condition is that the facilities do not significantly burden the environment.

The CDU wants to implement the recommendations of the Borchert Commission on restructuring livestock farming and supports an animal welfare levy. Building and converting barns for better animal welfare is to become legally easier and continue to be subsidized. Processed meat is to be exported instead of live animals.

The CDU wants animals in barns to be better off. It thinks an animal welfare levy is right. That is a surcharge meant to pay for better barns. New and rebuilt barns should be easier to approve. Live animals should no longer be shipped abroad.

The Borchert Commission is an expert panel that put forward proposals for more animal-friendly livestock farming and how to pay for it. The CDU points out that the state has already subsidized barn conversions and halted cattle exports to non-EU countries. It wants to continue on this path. Regional slaughterhouses are to be preserved and supported, partly by exporting meat rather than live animals.

The CDU wants to introduce the Ernährungsführerschein (a school nutrition certificate course) in all schools and continue awareness projects in daycare centers and schools. Regional products are to be marketed better, and public institutions are to cook more regionally and seasonally.

Children should learn at school how to eat healthily. For this, there should be a nutrition course everywhere. The CDU also wants to support food from the region. Daycare centers and care homes should offer more regional food.

The EU school fruit program is to be expanded. Support is planned for so-called Edible Cities, meaning food growing in urban spaces, and for food councils in which local players from production to disposal exchange ideas. Digital platforms such as the Schleswig-Holstein quality label are to connect farm shops, independent markets and producer groups. Meals in public institutions are meant to set an example for private providers. The CDU wants to keep supporting the Lübeck network of food businesses and nutritional medicine.