Proposals for a European Organisation of Agricultural Markets

Abstract

The proposals for a European organisation of agricultural markets led to a great increase in the political activities of Dutch organised agriculture on international issues. The experience derived from its active participation in the discussions of these proposals was to stand Dutch organised agriculture in good stead on later international issues. The background of the proposals was both economic and political. The economic background was the growing economic co-operation in the late nineteen forties and early nineteen fifties among the member states of the Organisation for European Economic Co-operation (OEEC). In 1949, for example, the OEEC had investigated the problem of agricultural production in Western Europe and had emphasised the necessity for an expansion of agricultural production and a solution to the problem of markets. The political background was the growing desire among a number of European countries for closer European political unity. The desire for political unity manifested itself in the agricultural sector in the form of proposals for a European Agricultural Authority to supervise the integration of agricultural markets.