Luke Ming Flanagan: Soil Law Won't Help Without Funding
Luke Ming Flanagan, MEP, argues that the proposed soil measures will only measure soil health rather than improve it because there is no real funding. He warns that without incentives and money for farmers, nature restoration, agroforestry and other measures cannot succeed.
Summary: Luke Ming Flanagan sets out the central problem he sees with current soil policy proposals. He welcomes the intent to protect soil but says measurement alone is not enough; action requires incentives and a budget to support farmers.
Funding gap: Flanagan highlights that many related directives were mentioned during the debate, from nature restoration to water framework rules, but stresses that none of these will deliver results without money to incentivise farmers. He notes that we have less money now than ever for these measures.
On incentives and consequences: The MEP warns that passing laws without funding risks turning people against necessary reforms. He argues that if farmers are asked to do more without support, the outcomes for soil health will be poor.
Agroforestry and priorities: Flanagan raises agroforestry as an under-discussed solution that also needs funding. He contrasts available budgets for farming with wider public spending priorities, urging realism about what can be achieved without resources.
Bottom line: Flanagan supports strong soil protection in principle, but warns that without a committed budget and proper incentives for farmers, measurement will not translate into healthier soils or secure food production.
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Thank you very much. A very important thing to do. Without soil we won't have food and without food we won't have life. So it's fairly obvious we've got to protect them. I think what we're trying to do here makes a lot of sense. But it is only going to measure the health of our soils. It isn't necessarily going to improve the health of our soils. And to improve the health of our soils, various different directives, regulations were mentioned, nature restoration, water framework, lots of other things were mentioned. But ultimately to do a lot of this stuff we need to incentivise farmers to do a lot of this work. And to incentivise them, well surprise, surprise, we need money. And we now have less money than ever. I would have been in favour of the nature restoration law but what I wouldn't have been in favour of is there was no actual real budget put in place. And if you do that, all you do is turn people against doing what needs to be done if you don't provide funding. And at a time when there is less money available for farming, less money available for everything other than buying tanks and guns to basically kill people, you'd have to question how serious we are about soil. One area that I haven't heard mentioned yet is the whole idea of agroforestry and the benefits of that. But yet again you need money to incentivise people to do this. And we have never made less money available. So if you have a shopping list, and we do have a shopping list, and they are essential goods that we're looking to buy, unfortunately we're going to the shop with no money. At the moment we're a bit like a child at Christmas with a big long list. But I have news for you, Santy Claus isn't going to pay for this, we've got to pay for it. It's really important to do. I agree with the idea of it. I'd actually be worried what results we're going to find though because we're not investing enough in this area.
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