After a year of protests, the EU looks set to have a healthier relationship with the farming sector

After a year marred by farmer protests and polarization prompted by the ill-fated Farm to Fork strategy, the latest review of EU agriculture has signalled a potential inflection point, writes Roxane Feller, Secretary General of AnimalhealthEurope.

The recent Strategic Dialogue emphasizes “shared prospects,” setting a collaborative tone that could help rebuild trust, repair relationships, and restore the confidence needed between Brussels and the farming community. This approach creates the prospect of balancing sustainability with security, addressing environmental concerns in the context of the realities of food production.

Open, honest, and pragmatic dialogue will continue to be the best way forward, bringing together farmers and all related industries, including animal health, to ensure a just transition.

While reducing Europe’s livestock numbers may seem like an intuitive quick fix for bringing down emissions, a strategy focused squarely on cutting herd sizes risks jeopardising our food supply, increasing dependence on imports, and wreaking social and economic havoc in rural communities. The fundamental truth we must keep in mind is that farmers cannot simply abandon their animals because for many of them this means abandoning their farms and their futures.

Instead, the EU should strive for quality, not quantity, and support farmers to improve productivity to safeguard food security while at the same time reducing emissions and environmental impact.

Healthier herds, healthier farms, healthier planet – this is the chain reaction, once set in motion, that can reduce emissions and at the same time, sustainably meet demand for food. Here, the animal health sector offers a lifeline, a “third way” enabling farmers to cultivate sustainability without having to sacrifice productivity.

A growing number of studies have demonstrated a direct link between healthier animals and lower emissions. When animals are healthier, they require fewer resources to reach their potential growth and development, leading to a vastly diminished environmental impact.

To take just a few examples, deworming livestock can slash methane emissions by more than 30 per cent while tighter biosecurity in poultry reduces the spread of disease and can cut emissions by more than 10 per cent. These health improvements, including others such as  nutritional supplements, rapid diagnostics, and genetics, can play a crucial role in increasing productivity and contribute to an overall reduction of one third of global livestock emissions.

Healthier livestock can meet Europe’s ongoing demand for meat, milk, fish, and eggs, with fewer emissions and reduced environmental impact.

But this transition will not be easy. It requires collective effort and cooperation by the entire food production chain – from breeders to veterinarians, processors, transporters, and retailers, every stakeholder across the sector has an important role to play. As a sector, we stand ready to work with the EU to ensure farmers are able and encouraged to make use of these products and services as part of the transition towards greater sustainability.

The backdrop of this discussion is stark. Europe's agricultural sector is under extraordinary pressure, facing the triple threat of war in Ukraine, extreme weather events driven by climate change, and significant policy shifts. As the EU moves forward, it must ensure that farmers have access to the tools and support they need to thrive in a changing landscape.

Ultimately, Europe’s transition to a sustainable food system will succeed only if it is built on a foundation of collaboration, commitment, and care, and if it successfully brings together policymakers, farmers, and supporting industries, to chart a course that leaves no part of the animal-source food supply chain behind.

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