CHALLENGES OF THE COMMON AGRICULTURAL POLICY IN THE ENLARGED EUROPE

The Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) has its roots in the 1950ʹs, when the western European economies, seriously damaged by the war, could not guarantee the food supplies. Initially, the CAP aimed at increasing agricultural productivity in order to solve the food supply problems. Since then, the CAP faced continuous change and adjustment process. This paper aims at analysing the recent changes of the CAP, their impact on the member states as well as the future challenges of the CAP in the enlarged European Union. The approached subject needed an adequate methodology, which included both statistical analysis methods and sociologic analysis methods. We had a large survey of economic literature on the subject, on the European statistics and debates and we have also analysed the current economic and agricultural situation of the new member countries and the challenges they are facing after their accession in the EU. We noticed that, despite the reform of the CAP in the perspective of enlargement and despite the structural funds for the new member states, these countries face huge problems, especially where the agricultural sector has an important share. Besides that, the CAP faces other challenges too, such as the environment protection, food safety problems or the financial support for agricultural policy. All these problems have been analyzed in the present paper as well as some solution we propose for overwhelming them.