Informele bijeenkomst van ministers van Landbouw op 16, 17 en 18 september (en)

The Informal Council of Ministers of Agriculture and Fisheries is a tradition in all Presidencies. It represents an opportunity, in an informal environment, for the President to promote reflexion and debate on leading matters that are important to push forward the Common Agricultural Policy. These meetings are also an excellent opportunity to deepen personal relationships among Ministers, the Commission and other guests, strengthening and developing ideas that facilitate the works at the Council's formal meetings.

Holding the Council's Informal meeting in Oporto and the Douro region has two objectives: to divulge once again this national region of excellence, unique in the world, offering a good social environment for Ministers and Commissioners to communicate and, without forgetting that wine reform is under discussion, bringing forward, through the winegrowing region of Douro, the realities of a sector that is so important.

The work session will be held at "Alfândega do Porto", during the morning of 18 September, with the discussion of the theme "The importance of the food industry for the sustainable development of rural territories". Without forgetting the file that the

Commission intends to present in November on the "Health Check" of the CAP Reform, it is a theme that continues the debate on the future of the European agricultural model initiated in the Informal Councils of Oulu, Finland and in Mainz, Germany, and which intends to show the great contribution that the maintenance of agricultural production, organized in a perspective of productive lines, has brought and will continue to bring, for the sustainability of rural territories.

In the programme of this Informal Council is also included a visit, on the 17th, to Quinta do Seixo, in Pinhao, in an attempt to give a panoramic view of the Douro's Delimited Region. In the evening of the 16th there will be a performance of a Portuguese singer, Mariza, at Casa da Música.