Warren and Bernie's vision for a socialist America... corrupt, expensive, and overseen by a huge repressive bureaucrats.
10
If you had not said it was Europe I would have thought you reporting about the USA.
Americans still believe that most farm production takes place on small family farms. It doesn't.
most chickens and eggs are now produced by large integrators. like Tyson, Purdue and Sandersons, Pilgrims and Kock Foods. Most Pork is produced by the Chinese owned Smithfield. Huge amounts of grains are produced by Cargills, ADM, and the like.
Every year the Farm Bill hands out $8 hundred billions in corporate welfare to these behemoth companies (many private or foreign owned) and tags on a bout $67 billion for food stamps.
Europe is positively mean in its support of farmers, many of whom actually farm.
37
Excellent journalism! Thank you NYT. Keep up the good work.
32
This report makes so much sense and why my former boss - who fired me after 22 years to get away with stealing $80k in my earnings - bought himself a nice vineyard and Chateaux in Bordeaux a short drive from his official home in Monaco, adding to his apartments in London, New York, Miami and Jamaica. He's appears in the Paradise Papers for good reason, as he exploits American workers in America to subsidize his tax-free lifestyle overseas. Who knew he also benefited from free money from European taxpayers? Not me! But I should have known.
Just like in America, where the wealthy freeload on the actual tax payers.
35
Subsidies replaced price controls in the early Eurozone in 1992, and the fundamental principle of respecting the sovereignty of each state permitted local control of allocated cash grants.
Astonishing as this article is, it is this principle of the Union that is operative. So when member states like Hungary, which have corruption at the heart of their governments, so pervert the values of the Union, only larger reforms that adjust whole powers can root out the problem to save the founding principles.
12
Please continue this excellent investigative reporting. One reason why I subscribe.
26
We have exactly the same corruption, if a complete investigation can be done with american oligarchs and their big farm’s. “DOLE” is the biggest one. . if you go to HAWAI, see how “ Dole “ took every peace o land to plant pineapples,for years. Now is a tourist attraction only. Dole and many agriculture multinationals destroyed small farmers in Mexico and other Central America , South America nations. We give too much subsidies. How corrupt this can be?The corruption is worldwide.
11
Just a bit of information...
18.4% of households in the U.S. receive SNAP, or food stamps, the funding for which is part of the farm bill. A bigger percentage of the farm bill funds go to SNAP, than to farmers.
The "farm bill" costs U.S. taxpayers about $100 billion per year, but 80% of that goes to nutritional programs and FOOD STAMPS, or SNAP, and only $20 billion goes to the farmers.
7
Just a bit of information...
18.4% of households in the U.S. receive SNAP, or food stamps, the funding for which is part of the farm bill. A bigger percentage of the farm bill funds go to SNAP, than to farmers.
The "farm bill" costs taxpayers about $100 billion per year, but 80% of that goes to nutritional programs and FOOD STAMPS, or SNAP, and only $20 billion goes to the farmers.
3
Any farm subsidy linked to acreage farmed is going to encourage consolidation (we have the same thing with mega-farms in the US).
The only subsidies to farmers I see as justifiable as perhaps for crop-insurance to help smaller growers protect against losses from natural disasters and diseases.
Agriculture really should be under the purview of the WTO, but every country resists that, especially since in most countries like in the US rural constituencies are disproportionally empowered in the legislature.
48
@NH One of the things that became clear in reporting this story is that all subsidies, like most things, come with tradeoffs. The US favors crop insurance, but that can encourage farmers to plow in environmentally-sensitive areas. Loss of investment is a check on farming in, say, areas prone to runoff or drought. Removing that check is a tradeoff.
I've become a bit of a dork on this stuff, but for the purposes of this article, we really weren't trying to put our thumb on the scale of "Subsidies Are Good" vs "Subsidies Are Bad." We saw a gigantic $65 billion program that was shrouded in secrecy and tried to explain where the money was going.
82
@Matt Apuzzo Thank you for your reply and your points on crop insurance subsidies.
In general, subsidies are market distorting, just as taxes, but are certainly a tool to use when you want more of something than the market provides on its own. (Education is a great thing to subsidize for example). Agriculture has always been seen as a sensitive industry that is not to be subjected to market forces (mostly due to fears over food security and not wanting to be dependent on food imports, and due to the power of rural votes). In modern times however, I think agricultural subsidies are hard to justify, and as you point out very well in this article the EU is enabling blatant corruption through its poorly designed and antiquated system.
12
@NH the EEC has a system called set aside, whereby farmers could elect to take money from the EU to take their land out of production. This serves to limit production and keep food prices higher than needs be. I had a friend who as a farmer in the UK said it was easier to wait for his annual million sterling set aside check than to work the land. go figure.
8
Please! How about do a complete investigation in the USDA. The corruption in the nation is unlimited.
5
Trump and many politicians love this style!!
2
Great reporting and timely - as we celebrate 30 years since the communism regimes fell in Eastern Europe. Makes me think of Romania - I was surprised it was not mentioned here - where corruption is rampant and European funds are consistently siphoned to those in power. The same schemes operate everywhere. Childhood friends, ex-wives, mother's in law become obscenely rich over night. In the meantime, real peasants are disappearing as they cannot compete. The system truly functions like mafia - from top to bottom. In Romania every county has a "landlord" connected with the party in power. The landlord owns land, farms, animal farms, you name it. It's absolutely sad.
6
Just a note to say this was an incredibly well researched and written article. Great reporting.
18
Another great piece of journalism! Kleptocracy is on the rise. Ordinary people are being smothered around the globe!
12
The driving force behind the Common Agricultural Policy was the need to reconcile German and French interests as they were perceived in the mid-fifties. This was slow in coming. The European Coal and Steel Community was created in 1951, when West Germany itself was barely a nation. The Treaty of Rome, which founded the original European Economic Community, was signed in 1957. The CAP came into existence in 1962.
During this period, the French government encouraged the mechanization and consolidation of rural properties. The number of active farmers declined from 7.4 million in 1946 to only 2 million in 1975. These were referred to later as the “Thirty Glorious Years” of the French economy, so the French as a whole must have been pleased with this course of events. The trend continued and at present there are somewhat under a million people engaged in agricultural work.
France is Europe’s largest agricultural producer, with 116 billion euros annually (French government figures for 2010). Its annual subsidy from the EU is around 11 billion euros.
So the idea that the CAP was founded to improve the lives of small farmers is not really true. Its purpose was to strengthen the French agricultural sector, and the internal organization of French agriculture was always a matter for the French government.
It appears that EU agriculture subsidies in Hungary are going mostly to large farm owners and not to small farmers. However, this is in line with their original intent.
4
The parallel Mr. Apuzzo draws with feudalism is stark and salutary. Power exercised by land usurpers, particularly in central Europe is a feature of the past thousand years or more of the European history and is the foundation of the modern, deeply corrupt capitalist economy.
Ordinary people whose livelihoods have been dependent on the use of land have been consistently brutalised and dispossessed for centuries. The abuse of European Union subsidies is simply the most recent tool engineering modern feudalism.
What is chilling is that the European Union, that has largely been a source for good, is complicit in this feudal land grab despite its ambitions to exercise greater political control through “ever closer union,” and that it is turning a blind eye to gangsterism reminiscent of the descent onto lawlessness following the collapse of the Roman Empire.
4
Great reporting by Gebrekidan, Apuzzo and Novak. Thank you all for this well-researched piece.
The farmland scam in Hungary is really no different than the way the spoils of the old Soviet empire were distributed to the nomenklatura. The well-connected pigged out on the assets of state-owned enterprises through rigged auctions at pennies on the dollar.
Disillusioning that feudal systems, a relic of ages past, have not disappeared in the 21st century. Far from it, they have simply mutated, evolved and are stronger than ever under the corrupt leadership of Orban and others.
6
Are you sure you got your figures right? The article says that these agricultural subsidies are worth 65 billion and, later on, that they represent 40% of the EU budget, its largest expenditure.
The EU budget is way higher than 160 billion!
There was a time, back in the '90s, when the CAP was worth about 42% of the EU budget, but the expenditure was around 860-880 billion ECU (ECU = what later became the Euro).
And another thing, when the EU takes decisions centraly, we're undemocratic, elite bureaucrats, when we leave the decisions to the Member States, we're financing corruption. There's no winning with you people!
20
@Elena M.
Exactly. This piece might have some factual basis somewhere, but there sure is a lot of embroidery going on around the edges to sell clicks...
3
@Elena M. Yes, the European Union budget is about 160 billion Euros.
https://europa.eu/european-union/about-eu/eu-budget/expenditure_en
Your comment about "winning" is well taken in the sense of the general debate about the future of the EU (though you don't need to win with me!). The question about how to govern/regulate 28 countries without a centralize government is indeed the question of the EU, one of the most ambitious democratic expertiments in history.
33
@Elena M. It doesn't seem as though there's any "winning" with the EU system either, unless you are a corrupt "farmer."
3
So, whats different then our farm programs? Billions to large corps, to sugar industry, and lots to people to not farm. We need to examine our corrupt system.
6
Great article, but it makes me sick. If the EU can't clean this up quickly, how can thoughtful people support it. I will have to reconsider my oppositioin to Brexit.
2
Yet the media and most people seems blindly anti-Brexit.
1
50% of America's farm subsides got to the top 10% of American Farmers. This is also an American problem.
9
Great article. Thank you.
2
Cue the Orban apologists who, interestingly, pick on details (quibbling about "Europe’s farm program, a system that was instrumental in forming the European Union" and whether that is accurate - it is and isn't but that's not the point, and use of "antidemocratic forces") not the substance of the piece. Reminds me of Trump et al. Don't deny the substance, instead focus on words or other nonsense. These people are dangerous.
7
This is an incredible tale of corruption which dovetails politics and money and the destruction of a middle class, elements happening right here. All expedited by the GOP
6
So how is this different that US corporate farms raking in millions? I remember Michelle Bachman being one member of Congress who profited mightily from ownership in a farm they had no hand in running. How many others are there?
11
This article is written as though EU farm subsidies are only a problem in a handful of rogue countries, who happen to be EU critics. It seems likely that this very real corruption is fairly insignificant as long as these countries remain highly critical of the EU. After living in Europe for two decades and knowing farmers in Austria, Hungary and the former Yugoslavia, this article avoids the main problems of these massive subsidies dispensed throughout Europe. While Europe has benefitted economically from the market protection these subsidies provide, its profound cultural effects on farming across Europe, as well as country-specific corruption and inefficiencies both in Brussels and at recipient countries (all largely free of democratic participation and investigative oversight) are the bigger issues that are not addressed here at all. The very real trangressions addressed here are minor, relative to the big picture, and draw fire from where it's needed... but this might be too critical of the EU (or globalization), in general. NYT readers seem to appreciate the investigative journalistic aspects of this article, without seeing the bias and apparent political motivations behind it. Poor quality research is better high quality research when it's used as a political tool.
No replies will likely be offered for this and other harsh critiques for fear of increasing their exposures.
5
@carl bumba your arguments are not very clear. you have to be specific.
The subsidies in agriculture might be connected with corruption in several countries, but not always lead to profit for the government or their friends.
It's well known that the Hungarian government is corrupted, so this article indeed is no surprise. But it's one angle of the corruption problems that are evident to whoever has connections in Hungary.
2
So, you're saying what?
The US has long way to catch up Europe in terms of quality, sustainability, the political and economic fairness of our farming sector?
Because you'd be so right.
In every way except quantity of food, American Ag is a laggard and a scam.
We're hard at work driving small and independent farmers into the ground, economically. Ta-ta, boys.
Then we sell their land to the Chinese, and give them subsidies. Smart, yes?
We're creating mono-cultures of so many crops, we're a Potato Famine waiting to happen.
Like all good socialists, we mandate which crops sell well enough for high enough prices and which ones we really don't want people to buy.
For example, Trump boosts corn production by forcing all of us to wreak havoc on our cars.
We make welfare queens of our rugged he-man farmers, setting aside billions and billions of dollars in unnecessary subsidies which go without fail to government apparatchiks and already-too-wealthy corporate farmers.
Interestingly enough, among this hearty yeomanry which spends nights when the square dance is on hiatus hating every poor factory worker and janitor who gets some sort of government benefit from Liberal Socialists, we set aside hundreds of millions of dollars just for farmers (and governors and senators pretending to be farmers). Sissy-pants suckers at the government teat, every one. Socialist welfare-queens with combines.
You're right, we have a way to go to be in the same league as the EU.
9
Another reason why the USA has to demand 0 tariffs on our agricultural exports to Europe or place huge tariffs on the EUs exports to the USA. The EU runs a 380 billion dollar per year trade surplus with the USA based on their corrupt practices. Then on top of that we pay for their military protection, what a bad joke.
2
The bad joke is the poor quality of US education, not to mention agriculture...
10
@Tammy
Surely the "military protection" payments are simply the price of a long standing USA policy of fighting its wars in other peoples' countries.
1
@Tammy Apparently this "protection" thing is the new lollipop of Trumpists… I dont remember Europe in need of military protection from anyone the last, what 70 years... It's the US that needs a stand closer to the Russians. Of course Russia and the US are friends now.
The surplus (if it is indeed a surplus) of Europe in agricultural products is because of the higher quality of European products, thanks to the higher standards that we have imposed in our agricultural sector.
A large percentage of farm subsidies in most of developing countries including India work in the same way to promote vote bank populist politics that enrich few big farmers and oligarchs, besides political leaders and industries connected to them.
Indian sugar cane industry and its powerful political lobby is widely studied in that respect. But that practice is not limited to just one crop, sugar cane, or just in few areas.
Students and scientists in agriculture need to be well-aware of politics as it has huge consequences in terms of food supply, quality of food, agricultural labor issues (mainly gender disparity, mainly in less democratic developing countries). New technologies, improved seed varieties, better farming methods can not substitute the role of politics and public policy for sustainable and quality food supply.
We often forget that one major reason for not only famine but also malnutrition and hunger is not agricultural but political. Now only about six countries in the world are "fully self sufficient" in food production. The only European country is France. USA & India are in that list too.
We often forget that- "Famines take place only in the absence of democracy." and all these countries are increasingly suffering from lack of democracy (as said by Noble Laureate Economist, Amartya Sen- https://www.newyorker.com/news/the-new-yorker-interview/amartya-sens-hopes-and-fears-for-indian-democracy
4
$65 billion!!! EU is as corrupted as Africa or worse. EU should look at the mirror instead of pointing figures at others.
3
First thing I've seen (though I haven't paid a huge amount of attention) that makes me feel sympathy for Brexiters.
2
Where's the companion article on how Oligarchs and Populists milt the USA for Millions?
14
How about a follow-up article on how oligarchs and populists milk the U.S. for millions.
11
Matt - thank you for taking the time to write this article and also on responding to some of the reader comments. It is not common for authors to respond to comments but the insights you have shared are really helpful to provide some more colour on the reporting. Thank you
3
@Kenny and we do know the article does needs a few more drafts and a lot of added insight to paint an accurate picture...
2
“The European Union has very limited instruments for dealing with gangster member states,” he said. “It’s true on policy, on agriculture, on immigration.”
This helps explain why so many Eastern Europeans left their countries to find work in Britain, and why the British cited immigration as the main reason that they voted for Brexit.
Tremendous numbers of immigrants from Eastern Europe (and from Muslim countries) have left many British feeling displaced in their own country.
1
@ann
Eastern Europeans flee to Britain where they are eligible for free housing, welfare, and medical care. On 3/11/18, the British tabloid, the Sun, carried this headline: "MIGRANTS BENEFITS BILL: EU migrants in Britain claimed more than £4bn a year in benefits: Migrants from Eastern Europe received more in welfare than the average UK citizen — and paid less income tax, figures show”
The article said:
"In the run-up to the Brexit referendum, ministers had insisted the figures were not available. But the cost of open doors migration has now been revealed. Data from the Department for Work and Pensions, taxman and Treasury shows EU workers received more than £2.2billion in tax credits and housing benefits, £1.1billion in out-of-work payments and £700million in child benefit.
There is a stark contrast between Western and Eastern Europeans. Nearly half the personal taxes paid by migrants from countries such as Romania, Bulgaria and Poland went straight back in tax credits and child benefit."
This helps to explain why so many of the British voted to leave the European Union.
2
@ann
I'm British, born and bred.
The Sun is slightly less credible than the Daily Mail and neither one gets near the tooth fairy in terms of veracity.
Wouldn't even want to wipe my bottom with them.
18
But yet US liberals can't believe that when asked in a referendum, working and middle class Britons voted in favor of Brexit. Is it perhaps because they don't want to be gouged by corrupt unaccountable EU overlords in Brussels and their oligarch corporate masters? Liberals in the US could learn a lot from Brexit if they stopped all their pearl clutching and lamenting over the move as some dreaded setback for the all-pervasive neoliberal corporate order.
4
@DD it has more to do with slanted reporting in the tabloid press directed at the uninformed than facts on the ground.
I hadn't quite put NYT in the category of tabloid press just yet. Apuzzo et al are very convincing at that, at least.
3
The corruption of former "children" of the Soviet bloc family, reflects the corruption in Putin's Russia. Corruption is the warp and weft of their national fabric and cannot be cleaned up as though it is something separate.
To put it another way: The baby and its bath water have become indistinguishably merged.
4
This is superb journalism and a redolent reminder how much we, the population, should deride those who deride the genuine media as arbiters of “fake news.” My thanks to the New York Times; investigatory reporting of this type can be deadly. I applaud the courage and tenacity of your fine journalists.
16
The corruption of former communist countries is disturbing. But small farms are extremely inefficient in central and eastern Europe, and these countries now have labor shortages in industry due to super-low birth rates. The more small farms consolidated into bigger ones, the better.
1
@Amanda
The labor shortage is also due to all of the working age adults who have left their homes in Eastern Europe to live in western Europe. There are so many Eastern Europeans in Britain alone, that they and the large number of Muslim immigrants in Britain, help to explain why so many of the British voted for Brexit.
2
There is no way for me to judge what is really going on in Hungary.So I deal with what appears on the surface.I left Budapest in !956 at the age of 17 and make a sentimental visit back every few years.
Each time I go back I see a palpable economic progress.There is clear evidence of vigorous political opposition to Orban .There is free press and for the life of me don't see oppression and no evidence of dictatorship.Orban is very popular and there is a pride in being a Hungarian
In Germany the head of the Jewish community suggested that it's members should avoid anything that would identify. them as Jews.In Malmo , Sweden a non-jew wanted to see what happens he put on a skullcap and was attacked by a mostly Muslim crowd.There is an active openly Jewish life in Budapest with safety surpassing New York under De Blasio.
The New York Times should focus on Clintons and the Bidens before attacking Orban.I don't doubt that Orban is flawed but he is better than any of the alternatives that I see.
4
@Gdk
I don't read Hungarian but I didn't see such a rosy picture. I did see a prosperous and active centre, mostly Pest, less so Buda. Also overrun with out of control drunk European tourists (one nationality that will remain unnamed).
Prosperous is relative. It is charming but the overall impression is it'll be awhile (if ever) before the beautiful but decrepit buildings beyond the hyper centre are restored to visibly to their former glory.
Something is clearly wrong though. Almost none of the family and traditional places I went to 5 yeares ago remained. Restaurants in the centre are beautifully redone but half empty. The excuse is always "the space is reserved", but the reality is there is a dearth of serving staff and those who remain either belong to family restaurants and perhaps have a stake in staying or started last week and don't know what they're doing. Any young person who can stand on two legs without falling over has left the country for Switzerland, Germany, France, the UK or Scandinavia. I bought tour tickets and the seller lamented the city was taking over all the bus companies and she'd be out of a job at the end of the summer. They make too much money for the cronies to leave the business to others. She planned to go to Switzerland and asked my opinion of France.
My friend, an IT engineer, left for China because a job there paid better.
I like Budapest but those who are left appear in dire straights. I won't be going back soon, too depressing.
6
@Andy I often go to Hungary, for my wife is from there. I haven't seen a more depressing place. I feel the country still acts like they are under communism. What is "funny" is that there is no opposition to Orban. Except for Budapest, the whole country is painted in Orban colours. All media, except maybe index.hu, is controlled directly or indirectly by Orban. People, like Gdk are scared of immigrants, but there is NO immigrant in Hungary. The salaries are so low, no immigrant wants to be there... Besides, Hungarians are also migrating abroad for the same reason.
5
I would be more than happy if Hungary were kicked out of the EU and NATO. They like the Russians? Ok, live with them. I know many wonderful Hungarians and thank goodness most of them have left the country. it is like 1956 all over again with Hungarian innovation and brain power fleeing as fast as it can. Hungarian nationalists have an amazing ability to almost always be on the wrong side of history. Kick them out and they continue their role as an irrelevant backwater.
11
It seems trumpers have taken over the E.U. in full force.
1
Well done. Thank you for exposing the utter corruption of the Orban regime. He and his Fidesz party have destroyed a promising democracy and recreated the patronage, graft and corruption under the communists. They're not called communists. The Fidesz party's mantra of "illiberal democracy" is just corruption by another name.
5
Yeah, but what about Google favoring it’s own products in it’s own search!? Clearly the EU has found the REAL villain /S.
Same thing happening here. Small, generational, family farms can't compete against enormous, government subsidized, corrupt, conglomerate Agribusiness. And, our food is becoming more and more unsafe. This ain't Russia. It's the United States of America. Bust the trusts.
6
The corruption of the EU farm subsidies which is set out in this timely article is truly shocking.
The EU should have a strong regulatory regime which investigates who is receiving EU agricultural subsidies. The corruption and criminal manipulation of these subsidies by these powerful right wing politicians and their cronies, should result in a zero tolerance policy and the recovery of these stolen assets.
Why does the EU need member states like this?
It is the revelation of this unlawful abuse which ultimately, contributes to and fuel's a movement like Brexit in the UK.
6
We hear much prattle from Congress Critters about "family farms" in the US, like we're talking about Ma and Pa Kettle - Fake News!
"Family farms", as designated by the USDA, account for about 99 percent of all farms. Yet "family farms" are not all treated equally.
"Small" family farms represent 89.9 percent of all farms, yet received 27 percent of commodity payments and 17 percent of crop insurance indemnities.
OTOH, "Big" family farms accounted for just 10.1 percent of all farms, yet received 73 percent of commodity payments and 83 percent of crop insurance indemnities.
It's understandable that more subsidies would flow to bigger operators, but we're not doing the small family farmers any favors - just exploiting their image as excuses to throw more slop into the trough of Big Ag…
5
I would love to see a similar deep dive on Big Ag in the US, including a map showing where all the bail out money went after Trumps disastrous tariffs.
7
Great article! Illustrates why so many people in the EU have such a low opinion of the EU. Would be great to hear how the parties and representatives in the European parliament respond to this! Please ask!
And, on another note: why does this story (much of the money goes to a small number of large farm oligarchs) remind me so much of what's going on right here in the US? Maybe because it's just the same! Really, what's the difference? Small family farms get neglected, large agro-businesses,so farms over 1,000 acres gets most of the dough. A we, the taxpayers, pick up the tab. Every year. It's disgusting!
5
Try small organic farming in the US.
4
I have always thought that it was a mistake to admit Eastern European countries in the EU so early. Yet, If we had not done it, they would now all be ruled by Russian puppets. Better to have the Russians at two thousand miles from Western Europe than at our gates.
2
This is fiat money “printed” by central banks. Its existence will become problematic when enough of it is out there to be recognized as the inflation of the currency that it is. Then, look out.
1
Excellent article. We never get info like this in the UK. Hence half the country wants to stay in the EU.
2
Fascinating article. I had no idea that Mitch McConnell ran the EU, too.
4
Animal Farm, anyone? Trotsky, Lenin, Communists, Orban - it’s all the same. Those in power take more.
And lest we think we are any better, it’s the same here as well. The big corporations and rich keep getting subsidies and tax cuts. The poor remain poor. And many of the red states take subsidies from the tax payers while simultaneously looking down on the blue states.
6
Thank you so much for this brilliant investigation, NYT! It really was about time to uncover the corrupt businesses of so many eastern european politicians. The fact that Italian mobsters are part of the game wasn’t new to me. Close relatives of mine run a small organic farm in Romania, and they too have been intimidated in land-related legal battles by such people.
Also worth mentioning are the many shadowy businesses and individuals making a fortune by looting Romania’s forests. I believe that alone would make a great article and would be worth a deep investigation such as this one.
Keep up the good work!
6
And just think, in America, we have the most oligarchs in the world. Time we voted as if we understand this.
5
Brilliant and timely reportage. Explains the profusion of luxury (German) automobiles parked alongside beggars in East European capitals.
2
Great article, much appreciated. Yes, clearly, Orban runs a kleptocratic regime. But, although you didn't touch on this, his kleptocratic tendencies do not mean that he is also wrong to absolutely veto allowing clandestine migrants to enter Hungary. It is possible to be terribly right & terribly wrong on two different issues at the same time. Also, this article points out quite well why in my view the EU is a doomed institution. Because of its rules, which call for unanimity on the most important issues such as EU membership, finances, justice and home affairs, the EU Council, it's most powerful rule-making body, can do absolutely nothing about Orban's theft and land scams, nor can they kick Hungary out of the EU. Why? Because Orban can veto any move against him (Poland and other eastern EU countries might even join him in vetoes). This is an institutional setup that cannot last forever. I eagerly await a follow-up article on corruption of the EU agricultural funds as practiced in France, Italy, and Germany. Corruption and favoritism in the EU agricultural budget are not just a Hungarian problem.
4
I've been working with EU companies for 30 plus years and the level of EU corruption, red tape and waste is eye watering. Even the auditors will not sign off on the EU books generally. The CAP has always been cesspit of waste and corruption and was developed as a political solution to placate French farmers. Nothing economic, health or ethics about it. Just politics! It's also a reason why EU food prices remain high and imports of many food related items from outside the EU (incl the US, Australia, New Zealand) are banned or face high tariffs. CAP has become an untouchable sacred political cow of European politics. Even top Brexit politicians like Iain Duncan-Smith are thought to benefit from it and stay quiet. Now it seems that our Eastern European friends are making a gangster use of the CAP. Not surprising at all. Will the EU do anything about it? Absolutely not! They only see things in terms of the European Project with a big dose of self-preservation added.
6
It is a good article, but it has some flaws:
It speaks of 65 billion subsidies, but only a (small) portion goes to Hungary.
Hungary is a special concern in the EU, for it undemocratic government. It is on the European watchlist.
The EU can't interfere in local (governental) affairs. So it doesn't turn a blind eye. It has no legislative power in this.
All in all there was a big gamble in letting 10 eastern europe countries in the EU. Most of them are still undemocratic, led by crooks and have pour laws to protect ordinary people.
5
The E.U. has its problems but it’s the best place to live in the world right now for ordinary people.
Hungary, Poland, ... are in the EU, that’s the way it is. Money is part of the grease that keeps the wheels of the Union turning.
What’s the alternative? Infighting and blocking everything the “other side” wants, converting and ruling over those with other opinions rather than compromise?
The E.U. works. The European Green Deal is happening, and yes it took some money and a new Commissioner For Protecting Our European Way of Life to get the new countries on board. The US should learn from this, not the other way around.
8
I was watching a Robert Redford movie from 1972 called The Candidate and it shows how little things have changed. The platitudes in particular are no different. The hopes and dreams are not different and that goes for the disappointments as well. It has gotten harder to hide the truth even if you are not looking for it.
Not much different from the taxpayer-funded subsidies doled out to America's multimillion dollar agribusinesses, the real welfare queens of this country, which take advantage of government handouts like crop insurance, commodity price supports and the conservation reserve program (CRP) which pays farmers not to farm. Originally designed to help poor rural farmers with small landholdings weather the dust bowl and the Great Depression, these subsidies are now a slush fund gobbled up by large agricultural corpotations. Between 1995 and 2017, the top 10%of recipients received 77% of the $205.4 billion doled out. The top 1% received 26% of the payments, averaging $1.7 million per company. Fifty people on the Forbes 400 list of the wealthiest Americans received farm subsidies. On the other hand, 62% of smaller U.S. farms did not receive any subsidies. Trump has increased this farm welfare with aid packages designed to offset farm losses caused by his trade war with China. Farmers can now triple dip and receive up to $125,000 in trade aid as well as up to $125,000 in “shallow loss” income entitlements. Crops and livestock are separate, so farmers could get $125,000 for hogs/dairy plus $125,000 for crops, if raising both.
76
@Christy
I read in the Economist several years ago that a large percentage of the farm subsidies in the US are sent to addresses in NYC.
2
@Christy The rural state Senators have to bring home their pork.
2
I don’t understand why there is no limit/ceiling to the subsidy. I understand the small farmer needs help but if you have the capital to buy/own hundreds or thousands of ha you should be able to work out if the business makes money without the subsidy. If not the and you can only be profitable with EU subsidy it should stay in the hands of the small farmers but not large corporations.
3
A succinct and well-researched article.
A similar effort on the money farming of the USDA would be an interesting follow-up.
5
Same happened in Greece where the bulk of subsidies were wrongly spent and destroyed agriculture and local farming .Of course a lot was siphoned by corruption. It is the EU fault not to have proper governance and controls in place and in effect aiding and abetting corruption. Same happened with the Structural funds for infrastructure projects. Lots of the money ended in real estate in Germany and the UK . The EU is the anti-democratic institution not the elected Governments of the countries. Just to be clear on what democracy means .
2
This points to the underlying flaw of any government subsidy. Over time, the primary purpose of redistribution shifts toward using citizen's money to maintain the power of the bureaucracy, and the bureaucrats.
7
This article is important work. The playbook seems to be previously communist state moves to become free enterprise democratic state and those in power make the rules and laws that on their face seem democratic but then a way is found to implement those laws so the assets of State Owned Enterprises/Farms end up in the hands of a select few who pledge and owe their allegiance to those in power - and the poor are barely any better off economically than before. It happened in the Soviet Union break up decades ago so this "play" is now nothing new.
The EU is either asleep at the switch on this (hardly likely) or choosing to sweep it under the rug rather than confronting member states whose actions subvert the purpose of the EU so it so it can keep growing and perpetuating itself.
I'm not holding my breath but hopefully this is chapter 1 in a larger play by the EU with the aim of making Hungary and other similar states so EU subsidy dependent that their leaders couldn't survive politically if the subsidies were withdrawn. And chapter 2 involves the publication of the corruption details, the threat of subsidy withdrawal if certain conditions aren't met and an ensuing election in which the opposition win based on promises of ending corruption and an improved relationship with the EU. I think I've read this before somewhere?
5
And just to add: Brussels in fact copies the system of clientalism between the Soviet Union and the Soviet Bloc. As long as cheap oil and gas and bank loans were flowing from Moscow to the periphery, everything was OK (with the occasional hiccup in 1956 and 1968) and the local autocrats kept everything under control. But once the money stopped, the whole system fell apart. That was exactly 30 years ago.
5
Appuzo, Appuzo,
Let down your hair!
And let me climb up,
to that rarefied air,
With no Hungary,
No Czech,
No Bulgaria there!
Give me Mississipi,
Come New Jersey,
Give me Louisiana,
Come Alabama,
Surely and for shame,
Where libel is King,
No dirt and no stain,
And no oligarch treads,
No need to name names!
7
@Andy Just a note: Czechia, no Czech.
2
@Jana thanks for the correction! Didn't think Czech Republic would work quite as well ;-)
1
Human history demonstrates that no matter what the system, there will be predators and psychopaths willing to game it to gain power and wealth.
It's hard to know that facing the future we face, greed and violence have the upper hand.
No good deed goes unpunished.
15
The EU is unaccountable to voters.
Some faceless bureaucrat is Brussels creates a regulation to help Polish farmers but hurts you? You have no recourse.
None. There is zero democratic accountability.
There is no way the EU, as constituted today, would have been approved by the voters in any country in 1993.
It's been a quarter century of creep.
Construction wages are up 15% because of the impending BREXIT.
Some say it's terrific, too much inequality.
Some say that's horrible, costs are going up and slur and smear the people who like the wages going up.
14
So I looked into your claim about Brexit and rising construction wages. As usual it’s more complicated then your comment would indicate. Like here in the United States there is a severe lack of talent available & apprenticeship programs are short of applicants. This has been alleviated by foreign workers coming in. That has allowed projects to proceed that would have been on hold, delayed or simply not attempted. So Brexit has raised wages in certain sectors while overall job opportunities are declining. Better pay with less work is not going to help income inequality. Take it from this retired working class union guy, this ain’t a win. Brexit is a sledgehammer where a Rubber Mallet is needed. You repair a problem, not break things out of ignorance.
7
Wages have already gone up because of Bernie. Let’s finish the world that should be done and raise all ships.
2
@Lilly , I'm sorry but your assertion is just as fact challenged as any Trump supporters. Bernie is not our savior any more than Trump was theirs. Raising wages is a complex and challenging issue that requires more than rhetoric to happen. It includes rebuilding union's and other working class associations. It requires a buy in from other parts of our economy and will not happen just by executive fiat. As much as I support a working class agenda I am skeptical that Sanders or Warren (my choice) can deliver more than good intentions. As Trump has come to see a committed opposition can run any agenda off its rails. His agenda is not mine but the example is still relevant. A single leader is not the answer, messiahs bring nothing but divisiveness & we've had enough of that eh.
4
Although Hungary and other illiberal, kleptocratic regimes in Central and Eastern Europe should be kicked out of the EU, progressive citizens shouldn't be punished for their leaders' crimes.
But the EU must suspend these countries' memberships until a new generation of voters emerge. Three decades after the fall of the Soviet Union, many - mostly elderly - in rural areas haven't weaned themselves off authoritarian rule and miss the economic security and social security under communism.
It’s disgusting what Viktor Orban is doing – attacking the EU relentlessly, violating rules and laws, while milking the bloc for hundreds of millions. It explains why he doesn’t want Hungary to leave.
His family and cronies bought public land dirt cheap, turning farmers into serfs, while receiving farm subsidies from the EU.
These thieves also have the monopoly over EU-funded contracts to build Hungary’s roads, railways, waterworks and other public infrastructure.
More than 80% of public investment in Hungary comes from the EU’s cohesion funds, which are intended to help poorer regions and countries catch up.
Jozsef Angyan had once the courage to speak out against Orban’s scheme, today he is being ostracised in a climate of fear.
Meanwhile Lorinc Meszaros, Orban’s childhood friend and former pipe-fitter is now a billionaire. When asked to explain his achievements, Meszaros answered: “God, luck and Viktor Orban.”
18
Great article, but sadly not much different than conditions in the US.
Take a look at the long history of the US government subsidy/land leases to a small monopoly of wealthy cattlemen in the Western states of the US. Individuals who get to use BLM and other public lands for their personal benefit as their cattle graze these lands unchecked.
Then too, we have the US Forest Service and the Dept. of Interior deeply tied to the timber, oil and gas industries, happily opening up access to large tracts of land for commercial use, most often with wretched environmental impact.
22
Thank you, NYT, for this investigative article. I wish our European media would run similar stories. We are too complacent with a bad system; just because it is around forever and an elaborate political compromise between the major EU countries is no excuse four dragging our feet and avoiding to make the system efficient and transparent. Europe owes this to its many small farmers, and to the future role of agriculture in the transition to a sustainable economy.
13
Actually The Guardian and Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung run similar but more limited pieces. Orban and his co dismissed it as liberal haranogue. The auditors did fantastic job but EU leadership has been so far reluctant to face problem head on. Voters, will at some point do it for them and it won't be pretty.
How is this different from US policy? Farmers large and small support Trump because of billions in farm aid. The ag tariffs are hurting the little guy, but they're good for the monster ag businesses that see this as a great opportunity to scoop up more family farms. Of course, the objective is to turn food into an oligopoly where profits are optimized by squeezing out lots of small competitors. Just as we've already seen in other big industries.
22
And we just gave away billions allegedly because of a trade war created admittedly by our commander in chief.
8
George, we do need to disentangle from any power China can have over us. This president isn’t going about it the best way, but on this point, at least, he is correct.
Old Soviet systems die hard, they just pick different "democratic systems".
6
As with all societies, countries, kingdoms, fiefdoms, monarchies, empires, cultures, governments, neighborhoods, churches, and alliances throughout history ... follow the money!
7
Seems one reason for Britain to exit the EU.
It's ALL about the $......the rest is just conversation.
10
So if I am in the UK, not contributing my share to this ridiculous graft is one reason to exit the EU.
7
NYTimes. YOU ROCK! again. Truth telling despite Brexit. Brilliant stuff.
6
Sometimes, I just absolutely despair. I've worked in charities for a good while, so I know there are good, decent, caring people in this world, but the number of greedy, corrupt crooks-who are already wealthy-they just have to have more, sickens me. The free press is our only hope. So many of our politicians have sold out. Did they once have principles, ideals? I don't know.
13
Great article -- accurately portrays a portion of the mess that the EU's common agricultural policy. Among American negotiators working on WTO agriculture issues, a common bit of dark humor is that we are all very thankful for the EU ag policies because otherwise the US would have the world's stupidest agricultural policy.
5
The continuing problem for American readers is that they perhaps do not appreciate the scale of the democratic deficit that the EU represents and which was the principle reason for the UK voting for Brexit.
As the authors of this piece show in the clearest possible way, the EU bureaucracy has absolutely no interest in reforming these large scale abuses because it is their way of buying off extreme right wing governments in Eastern Europe.
The farce that is EU "democracy" was shown most recently in the complete impotence of the EU's parliament in simply rubber stamping the appointment of a German nonentity as the next President of the EU Commission, this is the most powerful position in the EU.
This election comprised one candidate, and even then she only scraped through.
Members of the European Parliament don't seem to care much as long as they get their considerable perks including expenses that are completely unmonitored, unmonitored since that would be "an invasion of their privacy"!
You could not make it up..
7
This is nothing new and I don't know why the NY times never insisted and. bring this corruption everyday in the first pages. Agriculture is a machine of profit. Now with Trump all departments are practicing the best way to take advantage of the public money. The number of incompetent s and corrupt continue to grow exponentially.This nation is the most corrupt of all nations, and our model was adapted by other countries around the globe. One wonder why we have the 98% fighting for equality. We are pretending that the nation is the best, sorry! Yes ,the best in corruption. It’s is a virus. Every year the elite universities graduated a bunch of people, that will practice corruption too. Unfortunately this capitalism feeds more! and more .Majority of Politicians go to WDC, to play and get as much profit as they can. This is fact. The rest is nonsense.
2
Amazing reporting. Imagine the resources necessary to uncover the type of information. Few news outlets can do anything like this these days. That is why autocrats and thieves around the world are hostile to a vibrant free press (Donald Trump, looking at you). They don't want you to know what they are up to!
Instead of useless junk that will eventually end in a landfill, give a meaningful and important gift to those on your list this Christmas. Give them a subscription to the New York Times and/ or the Washington Post.
We must support a strong free press with action (and money).
12
How does this corrupt system compare to our system in the United States? Thanks.
6
We should focus on her own problems here in the United States. We have many.
5
Yes, like how Obama/Biden years created more oligarchs than Russia. Time for change we can actually believe in, because we can believe in Bernie.
4
Some perspective might help here. This is laughable and is good.
Laughable because, if decisions are left to faceless bureaucrats, they are not likely to favor transparency that makes obvious their cluelessness. No amount of money allocated to Eastern European countries will overcome their basic culture, their proclivity for immorality, stealing, mobsterism, what not. What was EU expecting? Change Hungary? A bureaucracy that is efficient? Laughable notions - all.
But this is also good for humanity.
Because richer EU countries, when they have money, invest in navies and arms. All (except England) are given to authoritarianism, flirt with fascism, hold leftist fantasies, and dream of dominating others. They conquer other (third world) countries, subjugate them, take their farms and minerals, exploit their labor. This is bad. They also concentrate people and declare war on each other that not only embroils the world, but also deploys hapless colonial troops sacrifice on their personal alters. Germany now possesses the technology to plain eradicate people they can easily identify, label as undesirables; they will if they can.
If the choice is corruption, or no corruption, of course it is clear. But the choice is EU wasting money, or EU doing what it does best - killing, warring, subjugating. If wasted money prevents them from doing that - it is ALL good.
1
@Kalidan you had me until "except for England". That you do not see the irony in the remark allows me to ignore the rest.
4
@Andy
England did not, as did France, after WWII, kill and bomb colonials carelessly when there was no hope. Please see France in Indochina, the death of possibly half a million Vietnamese and the destruction their presence begat. What did France learn from WWII? That their future was bending over in face of a strong German army, survive at the expense of American troops and continue killing in Indochina? For shame. This continent knows no shame, has yet to meet a war it will not support, a land they will not defile, a people they will not subjugate, and a colonial they will not kill.
England did leave peacefully from the Asian subcontinent (because they likely had no other choice), and focused rather exclusively on exploiting Africa. That might be the only difference. But it is an important difference. England has not, in over a hundred years, flirted with leftist visions nor with fascism. Hence they deserve separate condemnation.
1
@Kalidan
I'm certain there are tens of millions of people if not hundreds of millions who don't hold the same kind memories of the benevolent history of the British Empire as you do, much less its legacy, myself included.
So your interpretation of what an authoritarian regime constitutes reflects on you alone.
2
Now the trick is to syndicate this article in Europe where it will lead to justice and change.
5
Good article and should be a good argument by Brexiters for the UK to pursue Brexit.
4
i just wished European journalists do the same investigative work. Are you working with some other EU news on such project? It would have so much more impact if it you could follow the model of the leaked "Panama papers" when several news outlets across several countries collaborated.
3
Fascinating article. Good work albeit depressing, exposing the nationalist Mr. Orban as a nefarious con aided and abetted by the EU.
2
There is corruption in everything the EU does period. Not just farm subsidies. Same in US. This is why big government is not the answer. Capitalism isn’t perfect, no system is, but in socialism the government becomes the evil corporation while simultaneously restricting rights & choice.
12
Corporate socialism, which has resulted in more oligarchs in the IS than any other country, is not the same as democratic socialism. We need to raise all ships here. Not continue to vote for the rampant greed and corruption that got us here, under Obama/Biden, that paved the way for more of the same with Hillary, and resulted in the worst president in history.
2
@JOSEPH
This leap from capitalism to socialism in support of rampant corruption and wealth inequality is staggering. Before shooting off about socialism how about learning what it is. What we have is welfare for the wealthy and feudalism for everyone else. Real democratic socialism is nowhere in sight but would be better for the large majority.
8
All the more reason for England to Brexit.
6
Sad, interesting reporting. What effect would BrExit have on this subsidy system? How does this compare to the United States? Are American taxpayers funding what amounts to welfare for American farming corporations and billionaires? How many phony subsidies to billionaires for scientifically baseless 'carbon sequestration farms', for fails of this administration's trade wars, has the US funded?
1
I am an ardent supporter of the EU and often wish that my country, Switzerland, would be part of it, but I think that it was a huge mistake to hastily admit the former eastern-bloc countries into the union. They turned out to be swamp of bottomless corruption and a destabilizing factor for democracy in Europe.
100
@Jorge It was Britain who pushed for expansion of the EU. Then they didn’t like Eastern Europeans working in their country.
13
A lot of people might not know it, but this isn’t much different from the US. Just look at the sugar subsidies in Florida, or the soy, corn and wheat subsidies. Then there’s Lynda and Stewart Resnick out in California whose almond and pistachio farms use more water every year than every house in California combined. The WaPo even published an article in 2018 called “Why do we subsidize rich farmers?”
I think a many Americans are still clinging to the idea of “American exceptionalism.” I think at this point it is clear that our country suffers from the same corrupting factors as any other country does.
14
This is a very interesting exposure of the scale of corruption within the EU. Unfortunately for people following the behaviour of the EU since its creation, this is all too familiar.
A major aspect missed by the article is where the $65 Billion comes from. Of course, it's the ordinary tax payers in the few member states that are significant contributors to the EU's budget that bear this burden, all whilst our roads are filled with pot holes and schools are starved of funds due to "austerity".
1
@Adam I don't think EU have anything to do with your pot holes and schools. Blame your own government. London have the most Russian oligarks in EU, tax them.
What you report happens in the USA, too, with giant industrial corporate and private farm land owners getting giant subsidies. I met a “farmer” whose farms in Oklahoma he visited once a year. He knew nothing about farming but a lot about how to extract money. His farms were likely worked by migrant farm laborers and managed by real farmers who had lost their property. The small, independent farmers have gone the way of small, independent tradesmen, giving way to distant ownership by “business” people whose sole talent is to squeeze profit from the government of the people.
5
The difference between Social Security and Medicare and what is going on in the EU Farm Subsidies is not even close to the same thing. Social Security and Medicare are not Public Welfare programs. They are paid for by Employers and Employees, not federal or State taxes.
It appears to me that the EU could solve this problem by keeping control of the money and where it goes by not paying it out to the Governments for allocation, but by setting up a system whereby Brussels pays the subsidies directly to the small farmers. And only to small farmers.
We should also be doing the same thing here. Big Ag need not apply.
We need to ferret out all of the corruption in our own country, by investigating the Politicians in charge, including the Cabinet members. We need to see Trump's expense accounts, and the rest of them, who charge us for their expenditures while in office.
We need more whistleblowers in all of our Governments" agencies including the IRS.
This would be every bit as enlightening as this story has been.
26
Oligarch? What's that? How come we don't have any...or maybe we do - what would you call the Koch brothers?
Was Harvey Weinstein an entertainment oligarch, or just a pig?
Maybe these people in other countries, are also, just pigs, and Oligarch is merely a silly word that makes for a good headline?
Of course, you could say that Oligarchs have government connections - but won't that be Hunter Biden?
Note: Actually, the Koch brother, now.
9
The former PM of the UK, Cameron, married a true aristocrat with a castle and a very large farm. She received subsidies from the EU. Not a secret but nauseating.
The Times should have a look at the situation in Scotland. Half of the country is in the hands of aristocrats.
13
This article justifies Brexit.
6
@landless that does appear to be one point of it.
Can you say "agenda"?
3
The same Brexiters who worked so hard to admit those East European to EU?
@landless
No it doesn't but it does need sorting.
My house had serious roof problems, I'm getting it fixed, not knocking it down.
There's much more to Brexit than the inevitable results of capitalism empowered greed being left on a long leash.
This article is a bit harsh on the EU. There has to be a handoff at some point, deferring to national governments. The people in Visegrád countries keep electing problematic leaders and the other countries have to literally deal with them.
Their support or tolerance for the European Green Deal, for one, did not come out of nowhere.
4
It’s not only oligarchs and farmers, it is also the European Commission itself that is complicit in this scam.
1
The EU needs to deal with farmers directly and give subsidies based on factors like work, environmentally sustainable farming practices and yield, rather than just land-size. While turning a blind eye to corruption may get the support of the right-wing oligarchs, it will ultimately undermine the union and may fuel future Brexit’s.
216
This is one of the best investigative news stories of the year and one that the NYT's should be proud of. I hope that it sparks an outrage in the EU which brings about some positive reforms. However, many people believe that the system is broken and that reform is no longer possible in most cases, so perhaps only time will tell in this case.
416
@Todd Reform is not tolerated in the EU. It's run by a bunch of bureaucrats who have cushy jobs and couldn't really care less how the EU ends up working out for the majority of people. As long as the Brussels Beast can keep on supporting cushy EU jobs, it'll stay that way until the individual member states drop out and force its end.
4
@No Name
If you closely follow the work done in Brussels, youl notice, that its *not* the bureaucrats that botch the job, but a coalition of sleazy business types and right wing fear mongers, that thrive on decrying change in cultur, all the while they are changing the system to funnel money into their buckets.
19
@Todd
Buy NYT subscriptions for everyone on your Christmas list this year.
People don't want or need more stuff.
Information is power. Give the gift of enlightenment and power this year. Goodness knows it will come in handy throughout 2020.
8
“This is a crony economy, where friends and political allies get special treatment,”
Like when the son of a Vice President without relevant experience gets an $85K/mo directorship? Like that, do you mean?
5
Exactly. Say his name. Biden. We have become a land of Oligarchy. The land of the free and the brave. Time to vote for Bernie, I say.
6
I wish this article could be published in every language found in the EU.
2
Just think. We have more oligarchs than Russia.
3
This is a splendid and powerful example of investigative journalism at its best.Congratulations
2
More bad guys. Really bad guys. I want to do bad things to bad guys.
Bravo to these journalists. I am amazed that the Times supported their work because the Times is usually so pro-EU. But I am delighted, and love the map of land grabs. Love the translation into Hungarian. Will it be translated into Czech too? Corruption is corruption is corruption, wherever it may be found. Love sunshine on it. Go Go Go
1
I consider this pro EU. I am pro EU and I am thankful for this article.
1
People in the Czech Republic know what is going on. It is the older generation who keeps on voting a former StB agent Babiš. He buys their loyalty by increasing their pensions and spreads misinformation through his newspaper. I am deeply ashamed of him, but when I try to speak with any "babyboomer" about him, they always defend him, missing "good old days" when everything was so simple (I am generation X).
This is absurdly judgemental.
The EU isn't NAFTA, it's more than an economic and trade bloc. The travel is towards regulatory, monetary, legal and political union - the USE that many deny. It seeks to bring all European countries into the most prosperous, most advanced federation anywhere, population >0.5bn. This is by winning hearts and minds - how else to democratise and legitimise the wild West of the departed European Soviet bloc?
Winning this long game requires patience and money. It's not just an economic calculus. After all, how much American money was misappropriated trying to pacify Iraq and Afghanistan? What about all the post WW2 Marshall Plan money that was 'misspent'? My own country - in a fit of anti-American pique - spent a huge tranche of Marshall money on an independent British nuclear weapons program. Yet, with hindsight, you can see the point of it all.
Of course parts of Europe - especially Eastern - are corrupt and criminal. But, that CAN be addressed. Take Calabria, Italy. The EU has been funding the development of regional major highways - something the Rome has tried to do (and failed) since 1923. Naturally, large sums of EU money have been lost to corruption [1] but ultimately, connecting this backward, dirt poor region with the modern world may break the centuries old grip of the Mafia, faciltating progress, prosperity and democracy.
This is Europe's Marshall Plan.
[1] 12% of the EU's Calabrian road budget was lost to fraud. That's GOOD.
4
@nolongeradoc "This is absurdly judgemental."
Intentional or hapless, it clearly is a lack of perspective.
The EU is stuck with Hungary and the other . By explicit intention there is no effective mechanism to discipline or remove the countries, so it can't do much in the short term but buy peace and cooperation. Apuzzo et al are playing on the terrain of populists.
In the US the populists used to be called the Tea Party, but now with Trump they're just mainstream. I won't tolerate that level of stupidity running policy in Europe. The milk has been spilled, so we'll mop it up and take out a fresh pint.
2
The lifting up of Spain and Portugal from developing countries in the 80s to advanced ones is the strategy the E.U. is applying to Eastern Europe now.
It’s not just about trade, but also about huge investments in modern infrastructure and accepting some displacement of European manufacturing to those countries with their lower wages.
Corruption and populism are part of the growing pains in these countries, but far less significant in the bigger picture which I think is missing in this otherwise excellent investigative journalistic piece.
And there is Trump who may have destroyed vast swaths of farming here that may lead to mass starvation here and elsewhere. Trump uses executive orders and sweeping pens in his murderous endeavors. He must be removed from office lawfully and peacefully before he attains beastly stature.
1
Sounds a lot like what's happening in the US.
3
We have more oligarchs than Russia. Think about that. Then vote to change it. Not Obama/Biden-style change, which created even more oligarchs. Actual change.
1
Corporate welfare is the backbone of today's capitalism. "Your business didn't succeed with out government help" said Obama.
3
Obama may have said it, but he helped created more oligarchs than Russia. We don’t need more Obama/Biden style ‘centrism’. We don’t need even more oligarchs.
1
@LVG .....another right wing talking point taken out of context to spread misinformation..........and hate & fear.
1
Honestly, it's too in depth for me but quite an admirable endeavor to save the hungry of Europe and elsewhere from starving, and people do you know. After witnessing Trump and his Wall street following for years, I'm convinced that humans are worse than a pack of wolves. The pack ventures together in search of food. Humans prey on their own packs. The worst of humanity are locusts that migrate from land to land devouring everything and moving on to the next victims. The rich are very bad locusts, but don't think I'm a totally cynical person. I still believe the vast majority of humans are good and decent people who are preyed upon. The locusts use Television as their tools of conquest.
2
This article fits a pattern, so swallow the story the way the authors want you to, or think for yourself.
These corrupt countries were attached to the EU despite their known corruption. They were attached to the EU not to make it stronger, but to make it weaker.
Americans will find the familiar, straight out of the GOP : break government, then complain it is broken.
The main culprits : the UK and Germany. Oh yeah, also the US also want Europe to remain dependent for defense on the US because it was building a functioning EU military force at the time. The UK wanted the EU to stay a market only, and didn't wanted its "special relationship" with the US threatened either. Germany maintains its markets and secure low cost outsourcing next door.
Now that the UK is getting out of Dodge it wants to turn to its transatlantic "friend". We'll see how that works out. Looks like everyone's a loser at this sucker's game. Except the US, maybe...
3
Thank you, NYT, for laying bare the corruption of agricultural subsidies overseas. When can we expect the same scrutiny of comparable practices here in the U.S.? You owe your readers a full comparable accounting of the boondoggle domestically.
6
It is wonderful that the Times made this article available in Hungarian, given that almost all Hungarian news sources are not by the Orban government. Thank you.
7
It is interesting that the media always refers to foreign billionaires as "oligarchs" but never refers to American billionaires with that term.
5
@Lawrence If Europeans should eliminate farming subsidies, it would, in the neo-liberal world market, lead to the impoverishment of millions of Europeans. Why not focus on lifting people in the remainder of the world instead of racing to the bottom?
I'm disappointed by this article. Had the authors stayed within their roles as investigative journalists it might come off as compelling. The poor treatment of the larger context of the CAP and the EU, particularly the slanted (or false) comparisons to the US may win over Americans unwilling to dig further, but Hungarians who appear to be a main target audience, will dismiss it for what it appears to be, a hit piece.
2
The EU’s agricultural policies have resulted over the many decades prior to the fall of the Berlin Wall into the rich patchwork quilt of small farmers you see when you fly over mainland Europe, including the United Kingdom. Look for large areas of small family farms in the United States. Good luck. The story is about the inherent corruption in the post-Soviet latecomers to the EU. Sure, they need to fix it, but let’s throw the baby out with the bathwater.
3
This situation is a pure obscenity considering how French farmers are barely able to eke out an existence, and suicides are all too frequent as a result. As much as I fear pushing people into the arms of the extreme-right and anti-European Unionist Marine Le Pen, I would like to see the facts of this article blared loud and clear to our European Union representatives.
Compliments on the excellent reporting, even though I'm left feeling totally frustrated and angry.
@carolmimran
Fair comment.
But my memory tells me that that the CAP (common agricultural policy) of the EU, which led to generous, poorly scrutinised subsidies, was demanded by De Gaul to support French farmers therefore to enhance his own internal political base and was accepted as the price of keeping France in the union. Those rules are obviously applicable to all member countries.
It stinks, but so it goes, as Kurt Vonnegut said in a different context.
Capitalism is persistent and usually amoral.
When you have over reaching bureaucrats many of which are non-elected that work to their own ends amid secrecy what do you expect. And others wonder why Brexit? It is about control.
Shocked, really shocked! No surprise that those in power enrich the privileged at the expense of the rest of us.
2
Hungarian and central european corruption was a known and avoidable existential threat to the EU. A much more graduated path of policy cooperation and trade agreements before joining the EU should have been put in place, these countries should never have gained immediate access to membership. The problems were difficult to resolve in any case but by integrating them into the EU the problems are now nearly intractable. For the UK and the US, the weakness in the beating heart of a unified Europe was the primary goal. For Germany, it was markets. Everyone has won, except the EU.
That won't stop Germany from hypocritally criticising the CAP, though, we've seen this film before with German bankers and Greece. The US gets to complain about European defense it helped kill off. And you can see what a complacent media looks like by reading this article.
Only the UK doesn't seem to get much out of it in the end because it's "special relationship" with the US doesn't look so special anymore while it has opted out of the single market it hoped to benefit from...
3
Congratulation to Gebrekidan, Apuzzo and Novak for a formidable piece of journalism that was painful to read. I hope it makes a difference, but one has to hold steady. It seems that centuries of middle age feudalism finds a way to asserts itself.
Not all citizens have the same rights. And that is a shame for the EU. The EU cannot be an empty shell. But without an enforcing power, the underlying stratum will move regulations like a marionette.
Now, just in case nobody noticed, the Trump administration punished farmers with tariffs, and then siphoned billions for farmers without blinking. Punish, reward, control. Textbook authoritarianism. We should not look down on Eastern Europe.
87
No relationship whatsoever with the US Ethanol tax credit, which was a model of sound policy;)
2
This is an excellent piece of reporting. Even if you’re not interested in seemingly mundane matters like farming, the consequences of what is happening with the CAP in places like Hungary is far-reaching. What has happened to Mr. Angyan is disheartening and disturbing. Yet this is the trend across the Western world: a select few among the wealthy and well-connected are exploiting our democratic institutions (in the case of the White House, actively destroying it) for self-enrichment. Every time they achieve their prize democracy suffers: more wins raked up for the brave new world of Putinism.
I hope that Mr. Angyan finds the strength to continue speaking out against this corruption in his country. Defeat is not easy, but giving up is not an option. And if he is too tired to carry on, as it seems (I can’t blame him), then let us hope stories like this will inspire others to take up his cause and show him that his efforts did not go to waste. Ending corruption and defending democratic principles is a group effort. It takes all of us to make it happen.
48
@Joe C
I want to add that the entire world population is in a struggle for human rights and democracy. The struggle against greed and corruption is age old. But it is winnable through education. Alas, those with power and wealth also know it is theirs to win by denying education and knowledge to the people. They go so far as even making people think knowledge is a sin, quite possibly one of the oldest cons in the world.
4
This is the first time I saw a rationale for Brexit - why should the British pay for these subsidies? They’d be better off supporting their own farmers. (I’m still opposed to Brexit, but since I’m not a UK citizen, what I think means nothing.) It’s interesting that we don’t hear about this in the Brexit arguments. Maybe now we will. Thank you for this eye-opening report. But I don’t think the answer is for the UK to leave the EU, but rather for the EU to kick out those countries that should never have been members to begin with. I know, that is tough, even tougher than Brexit. But EU members should have some standards of anti-corruption and anti-oligarchy enforcement. It seems that being an Eastern-Bloc country leaves scars for a long time. We’ve seen articles about the challenges of reuniting Germany, and this is on a larger scale, with independent governments in each former Eastern-Bloc country.
1
Maybe this journalist can also look into how small farmers in the "old EU" lost their farms during the financial crisis, in order for banks to consolidate their losses; they would look to help the big farmers (barons) because the potential loses were and are today giant. In doing this they forced smaller farmers to sell, pushed them towards bankruptcy and they had no choice but to sell their land to these barons. The barons could then claim more EU funding and the banks would have access to liquidity. This is probably also true in the new EU countries. And maybe another bank scandal waiting to happen, if you add the IT companies milking this system every year, with pretense system updates, feature changes etc. I guess around 25% of fx. Denmarks EU farm subsidiaries go to "management" alone. Some of these IT companies are believed to run a carousel, organising the contracts between them. But again it won't be the EU who will clear this up, because they let in happened for so long in the old EU, and so how can you point fingers when you live in a glass house..
This article focuses on Hungary (3% of total subsidies) and Hungary, Poland, Czechia and Bulgaria as a group (15% of total). The questionable uses of the subsidies in these countries is definitely worth investigation. However, the article should not be misinterpreted that the remaining 85% of subsidies are just fine. There may be less corruption in countries like France, Germany, Spain or Italy (the largest users) but the misapplication is just as widespread as in the East, if not more. This could/should be the subject of a follow-up article!
Lets just have universal basic income and call it a day.
If we are going to redistribute wealth, which face it we are going to have to do before we collapse into war or revolution, lets just hand it out to everyone rather than the few who know how to game the system.
4
It is fascinating to see article after article about corruption in our modern, global financial system.
Even laissez-faire advocates, who proposes a cooperate police and parliament, considers this bad business.
Restitution/consumption/spending without any confirmation of correct goods?
All parties, in a democracy, leaves policy implementation to professionals, namely politicians.
They privatize for instance schools or farming, then to ensure good faith, assign auditors and inspectors so grossly underfunded that they can't complete their yearly assignments in hundreds of years.
Calculus much, much?
The result begs the question, what is the point of representative democracy?
I could stomach this article had I been given the chance to know about and understand the policy that made it possible.
This is indecently how EU failed their members of Great Britain that in turn caused Brexit(who could even relate to pro-EU predictions or disapprove misinformation from pro-exitors?).
They continue to fail all members every day until, well again, it doesn't take an expert to guess the end result.
2
It is difficult to avoid observing that the project to integrate the former Warsaw Pact into Europe has endangered democracy throughout the continent - leaders across the region have been weaponizing liberalism and the EU against themselves to cement illiberal regimes in power. I hope this excellent piece will awaken the politicians in Brussels (if, that is, anything can)!
9
@Philippe Egalité indeed. It was a known and avoidable existential threat to the EU, and these countries should never have gained immediate access to membership. A much more graduated path of policy cooperation and trade agreements should have been put in place. The problems were difficult to resolve in any case but by integrating them into the EU the problems are now nearly intractable. For the UK and the US, the weakness in the beating heart of a unified Europe was the primary goal. For Germany, it was markets. Everyone has won, except the EU.
That won't stop Germany from hypocritally criticising the CAP, though, we've seen this film before with German bankers and Greece. The US gets to complain about European defense it helped kill off. And you can see what a complacent media looks like by reading this article.
Only the UK doesn't seem to get much out of it in the end because it's "special relationship" with the US doesn't look so special anymore while it has opted out of the single market it hoped to benefit from...
1
Very interesting for most of the article. But I must protest at the opening line. The former farmers toiled yes, not for a state that had "stolen" their land, but for one that had collecdtivised it. Which ensured a more equitable distribution of the results and food for all, something many contemporary East Europeans find missing in today's economy. As you unwittingly show, freedom from the Soviet system has not meant prosperity for all.
5
The Eastern European countries had a chance to do this right. Rather than cut all their citizens in equally they did what Russia did. They auctioned the properties to cronies. Example: let's say there were 1000 acres and 1 million citizens. Every citizens would get an ownership interest of .001acres. After a certain time period it could be sold or transferred to a child or relative. The land could then have been leased and the lease revenue either paid out as a dividend (think Alaska), put into a sovereign wealth fund or both. Instead their citizens got ripped off. That a bureaucracy sits around and watches and ignores just shows that "he who has the gold makes the rules". Sounds like here.
2
Subsidizing farming is necessary because farming is a tough and unpredictable and typically low yielding financially job, but like no a welfare system somehow the billions of dollars of subsidization and of course that in Hungary as well doesn’t translate into progress defined as more nutritious foods, more successful crops. It’s a shame that in any country some of the billions in subsidies doesn’t go to farmers who present a plan to bring more local nutritious foods to their communities. Those who do this should get greater subsidies to expand their “good for Earthlings farms” .
Nice article, but that does only happen in eastern countries. It has also happened in western countries like France for decades. the money from tax payer go to the pockets of few and very rich farmers there who produce stuff we don’t need while polluting the soil and wasting the water .
But like the NYTimes says, farming subsidies are what keep the union together. Bureaucrats are afraid of breaking status quo
7
The wealthy and powerful of the world will never do the right thing, they must be forced too. You show me a person in the .0001% club and I will show you a criminal.
22
That's the conclusion I've reached. There are some humans who are just bad people and globalization has enabled to wreak more damage than they could in earlier eras. I'm glad I'm at the last leg of life, not 20-something with the impending societal catastrophe.
4
I point you to the American Mid West. Billions upon billions to keep whiny corporate farmers on the Republican side.
We gotta eat but...
33
Great investigative reporting, and a shame the European media is not up to the NYT’s standards.
10
Living in Europe and being affected by these machinations, I can't thank the NYT enough for their research and its publication.
10
@Rainer while the specific corruption mechanisms are well reported, don't swallow the rest of the slanted story.
1
I didn’t finish the article yet, but calling EU precarious?!
1
Precarious? Yes, The UK is about to leave. The EU might break up.
2
In reply to Sonia Gocalova
Precarious? Yes. The UK is about to leave. This might cause the EU to break up.
Yet people still wonder why the UK wants to leave the EU. As net payers into this systerm it is our money that is going to these criminals and the EU try to make out it is all fine and they know best. The hubris and arrogance of the EU are breath taking.
11
@Jason
Somehow, I don't think that the EU system will be fixed i the UK once they leave the EU.
1
@Cornflower Rhys As long as we are not paying for it I don't care how the EU spends it's money. The EU is an opaque organisation that is trying to create a superstate by stealth without the will of the people.
3
@Jason The UK did what it could to wreck the EU from the inside as a political entity including bringing on corrupt countries like Bulgaria and Hungary. Now they're getting out, and may discover life is not so rosy with "friends" like the US to turn to.
And here you come bringing that anglo US blinkered logic full circle, on display in all its glory...Maybe reading less of the Daily Mail and the Sun might help?
2
No wonder Britain wants out. In Britain only the Queen steals from the people.
9
Rudy Guiliani must be involved in this somewhere/somehow. I don't think he nor Trump could resist getting in on the grift.
Next, the NYT should do an expose on the American farm-subsidy racket. It's interesting how much farmers are paid to not plant anything.
6
We're fortunate the President Trump has cancelled his NYTimes subscription. Otherwise, upon reading the article, he'd be jumping on the phone to Victor Orban cajoling him to "do us a favor" and make a deal to establish Trump hotels and golf courses on these properties that would feature "farm to table" (wink wink) restaurants.
7
Trump would do that, too. He keeps a few goats on one of his NJ golf courses - he gets a tax break because the property is now a "farm".
1
This article is very important. Thanks Matt Apuzzo.
4
Mafia and political corruption historically are an Italian problem, but former Communist countries have demonstrated particularly keen to generate their own mafia and corruption networks. Europe should crack it down without any hesitation.
1
Why does this not come as a surprise?
3
Here in the Czech Republic, responsibility for investigating subsidy fraud goes to the Financial Analytical Unit (FAU) of the Ministry of Finance. While Andrej Babis (a huge beneficiary of EU subsidies) was Finance Minister the department tasked with investigating subsidy fraud was therefore reporting directly to him! In a political fudge, the FAU is now described as an ''independent administrative office'' within the Ministry of Finance. The Current Finance Minister is a close political ally of Mr Babis.
3
Wow - now this is a story.
Congratulations, NYT.
So if the subsidies stopped....would some of the land owners have to liquidate? And if so, how does the land get distributed afterward to ensure both that workers can build equity and food production doesn't suffer?
3
This is an obvious abuse. What isn't, is North America hiding subsidizing the wealthy by calling Corporations Citizens and Farmers.
3
This is just great reporting. The first step to stop corruption is ti bring it to day light, with the hope people will eventually get rid of corrupt leaders
1
Like others readers said, this is a fantastic article, a perfect example of why the world needs quality investigative reporting found in established permit/online sources, rather than internet news.
An important follow up would be how the agriculture practices of these “farms” are affecting the local environments across Europe - how they’re damaging water, soil, aggravating the insect apocalypse. We are all involved. No activity on this planet affects only the local area anymore.
5
Excellent article highlighting the corruption in the Eastern European countries. I would like to add that throughout the EU the common agricultural policy has encouraged overproduction and harmful enviromental effects of excessive farm chemicals, manure and poisoning of waters.
We have the same negative environmental effects of our bloated farm subsidies in the U.S.--excessive production of industrial crops, confined animal feeding, pollution of our surface waters, bays and rivers. Our farm spending mainly benefits huge farming operations in the U.S. too with small farmers getting almost nothing.
We need to convert our farms to sustainable organic operations that radically reduce carbon use, eliminate farm chemical pollution but provide a good living for small farmers.
13
and in the UK the old aristocracy get millions from the EU. Prince Charles' Duchy of Cornwall for instance.
1
Billions of dollars unaccounted for year after year, unauditable and gone forever. Sounds like the Pentagon budget.
2
Maybe Brexit isn't such a bad idea after all...
2
Sad as it is, the Hungarien people have a means to do away with this. Orban isn't invincible, at least not at the polls. They just need to disbelieve him, and his rants about foreign influence. But in all likelyhood, they will not hear you. It was a brilliant move on your part, to put up this article in Hungarian, but for the very fact, that it apears in the NYT, Orban will decry it as payed by Soros.
Meanwhile, foreign corporations, fueld by shareholder money lobby hard to try to get their share of the cake elsewhere, and alread succeded to put togehter large swaths of land in eastern germany.
Looks like collectivizing the land wasn't that bad an idea...
4
The sloppy, flip and undefined parallel the authors find between the EU's corrupt farm policy and our Social Security system is decorative journalism, uselessly defining the scope of the two programs, yet failing to note their fundamental differences. In truth, our social security system is sacrosanct because it is owned by its participants.
12
@Nick O'Brien Social Security and Medicare were compared only insofar as they are politically immutable systems. Third rails. Ditto with EU farm subsidies. Change is extraordinarily difficult. The farm policy is quite literally written into the founding documents.
18
Ohi, ohi! Now, the Eastern Europe countries' corruption is discovered! Great piece.
Guess which Western powers did push very hard to speed up those countries accession to the EU?
While some naughty Brussels based EU politicians and officers vainly claimed the unprepared state of those same countries to keep up with the EU rules and principles.
Forget it. USA and UK proclaimed the extraordinary urgency of expanding NATO and EU towards East to reduce and limit the 'aggressive' Russia!
So, they got the enlargement and 25 years later, they seem to discover the political reality of the Eastern Europe.
Bravo!
7
The industrial revolution in the later part of the 19th century supported high wages that induced farm workers to move to cities and work in factories. Countries that did not turn to manufacturing because there was not the coal, fossil fuel or iron ore resources to enable a local industry to compete with countries fortunate to have those resources was forced to survive on its agriculture. This kept farming wages and income world wide below those in the manufacturing industries. Result was manufacturing countries turned to subsidizing its agriculture. I well remember the 1930’s when my father struggled against these subsidies to make a living farming in Argentina. Now that I am farming here I figure if had I those subsidies I could afford to retire and golf once a month at Mar de Lago. One result of those agricultural subsidies is the huge flow of emigrants to manufacturing countries which seems to be causing a serious political conflict in the US and probably a big factor in Brexit.
2
Well there’s a vote for Brexit! Why does it seem that at every turn oligarchs and mobsters win? Good intentions pave over the innocent and clear a path for the corrupt.
This was not a fun read like the report about Trump, his father’s Manhattan real estate empire and the millions the younger Trump inherited and squandered. This reporting by the Times is more technocratic and far more important. The conundrum for Europe is what can be done to fix a system so tightly wound within the founding fabric of the union. Corruption!” is an easy rallying cry for the corrupt to use to build a movement. The EU could loose more than Britain if it does not make radical changes.
2
Well done, NYT! World coverage like this is needful. It is odd that a European newspaper was not the leader on this story.
And how disappointing the response of American readers is. It reveals our narrow focus on (and concern about) ourselves.
7
This is an absolute scandal. This is why I, like others, want to leave the EU. You cannot change it from within because it was BUILT to govern this way. My tax dollars. Wasted.
2
When Slovakia gets a mention in the New York Times it can never be good news. Brussels should spend a few millions from that subsidy budget to create a centralised smart task-force that would distribute the funds and cut stop the countries from doing it on the state level. Central/eastern EU countries cannot be trusted yet.
3
The intention is good. Food security is important in continent with such a climate. Problem is East European leaders act like mafia and EU is powerless to do something about them. Even Norway, a non-EU country is debating whether it is worth to contributing to development of old Soviet sattelite countries.
Well done NYT for great reporting. We used to be concerned about the Common Ag Policy because it distorted trade but it had some obvious merits in preserving rural life. But this is unbelievable- propping up corruption and virtual feudalism by crypto fascists. If Germany and France don’t show leadership and address this the EU will have lost all credibility. Why would the UK want to stay with this going on, although it would be better if they did.
3
This is a horrific account. The EU is corrupting and undermining the very countries we hoped would become democratic. "The EU seldom interferes with national affairs, giving deference to elected leaders" = the EU is too lazy/inept to control their funds. They are hideously unaccountable. Everyone should read the EU critique of former Czech President, Vaclav Klaus. How right he was:
'The EU is not like a classic parliamentary democracy with government in power and its opposition party. The opposition party part is missing. Here only one alternative gets proposed. Those who oppose it are labeled enemies of european integration. There is also too great a distance between EU representatives and citizens compared to countries. This distance can be described as the democratic deficit, the loss of democratic accountability, the decision making of the un-elected. The EU endangers everything accomplished in the last century. Citizens live with the feeling that the EU project is not their own; that the EU is dialoging differently than they wish; that they are forced to accept it. All this can easily slip us back into the command situation of the USSR era that we hoped belonged to history.
The EU should be scrapped and replaced by a free trade area called the Organization of European States. The EU as an institution undermines freedom (like the Soviet Union used to do).'
2
@Alexandra Bear
The UK did what it could to wreck the EU as a political entity including bringing on corrupt countries like Bulgaria and Hungary. Now they're getting out, and may discover life is not so rosy with "friends" like the US to turn to.
And here you come bringing that anglo US blinkered logic full circle, on display in all its glory...
4
This investigation shows how rotten the system is in terms of subsidies to eastern european countries. The culture of corruption is deeply rooted in this region and frankly the european union cannot do much about it because it doesnt have the instruments to handle the problem, in doing so would be getting into national issues, but then the money given to these countries comes from the european union, so it is the euorpean union who should control this corruption activities, but the european union is composed by political groups that protect people as this hungarian prime minister, so there is not much to do, especially when you have an incoming new administration that befriend these politicians. Ursula von der Leyen is a person who will not fight anything against this corruption, no wonder that is why the eastern european countries backed her up the choosing her as the new president of the european union.
This type of pratice will continue for generations to come, it is the nature of the eastern european union, so this is no news, but it is good newspapers as the NYT spread the news around the world about the behaviour of this region.
3
The other EU countries also mis-spend the monies, in France, where I live, the small farmers- for whom this was intended, have a hard time getting any EU monies, while the large ones get the most of it. The system is not good, needs complete revamping. What EU politicians ignore is that the people running the Eastern countries are: gangsters, crooks, thieves, mafiosi, on a large scale; whereas in Western Europe the large farmers keep the unearned funds...Hm, I'm having a hard time expressing the difference...
14
I only hope that everyone in the UK reads this before they cast their BREXIT vote. If such large scale corruption in the agricultural sector is this rampant, it boggles the mind to think of what must surely be occurring in every other sector as well.
The UK should get out of the EU as soon as they can. Any short term pain they may feel will be far, far less than what they would experience when the whole rotten mess that is the EU finally implodes.
5
@TrevorN Farm subsidies are the main money going the wrong places, the rest goes pretty well where it should, and you have to realise that this money comes from, for the most part, the countries themselves; with the exception of the UK, who get most of their money back in the form of the famous Thatcher 'check'. This is not a reason to bow out of the EU, as tempting as it may be.
1
This expose handed Boris Johnson a solid rationale for Brexit. Why should the U.K. enrich East European oligarchs?
There are loads of aristocratic families in Albion who deserve governmental help to maintain their traditional ways of life.
1
Another proof point that democracy has been corrupted by oligarchs across the globe. The US has been trending in that direction for a long time with Trump's election closing the deal. There is more at stake in the upcoming election than the low-information masses know. If the Democrats cannot figure out a way to combat the corruption within the Republican Party that enables the oligarchs, it may be time to start building the guillotines. Our country (and democracy) are at serious risk.
so good of the NYTimes to write this article also in Hungarian. I forwarded it to my Hungarian friends as there is not much reporting of this quality in their country.
5
This is a very welcomed article that put the spotlight on a huge problem with the subsidiaries of E.U.
What’s important to add to the article, since it is focusing on the “mafia methods of the East”, is that the oligarchs of western countries also are reaping millions in subsidies. In that sense I believe that article is somewhat to narrow in scope, even though it’s true.
As a European this problem is well known by the public, but there seems to be a resignation by the people, in any country, to really do anything.
1
And this differs from American Farm Subsidies HOW? We see the Corporate Farms thriving while the Family Farm disappearing.
9
I read somewhere that the total value of the ‘rebates’ given to US farmers this year (to compensate them for lost revenue due to Trump’s tariffs) will exceed the dollar value of the bailouts of the US auto industry ten years ago.
Is there a method to Trump’s madness?
Are his tariffs and the response to them a means of accumulating power?
7
Everyone knew corruption was rampant and a huge risk in countries bereft of democratic traditions and public accountability from Bulgaria through Romania to Hungary, etc. And the problem remains, but it is a problem that Germany and the UK forced on the rest of the EU by bringing on the central european countries to begin with, each for their own selfish reasons. All of these markets were already tied to the DM economy and Germany wanted them to remain an integrated market in its back yard, both for its exports and low cost production outsourcing. The UK just wanted the EU to remain a market only and ensure any political intiatives remain impossible. They've both achieved their aims while everyone else has to deal with the fallout, one consequence of which are the questionable practices documented here.
As for the article, good job on the investigative elements which appear credible and supported. I haven't dug any further but that's not my job. My take away though is that the article is nowhere near as informative as it appears as the context provided strikes me as limited and questionable, introducing a dramatic slant supporting a narrative but in doing so simply rings false. Don't bother asking for links to prove my point, it's not my job as a reader to back up some of the sweeping statements made on background. It is the journalist's job though to base their story on facts, and this article unfortunately does nothing to convince me it's journalism rather than an agenda.
1
In the US there are thousands of farms just as big as those of Orban's family and friends; And certainly many of those belong to "people of power"...
As far as the subsidies, if the EU are "3 times "as much, EU popupulations is almost twice that of the US so EU subsidies are not that larger.
And the granting grazing or oil prospection rights like in the US is not that transparent either.
So we might look into our own eyes before looking for a straw in our neighbor's
3
This is one deep and damning report. While I will remain a pessimist until proven wrong, I hope this news story helps unmask the fraudulent intent of the Eastern Europe’s so-called populists.
Whatever the outcome, I am once again left thankful that The New York Times exists and prospers.
1
I worked in these Central & Eastern European countries during the period when land privatisation was taking place and politicians were becoming aware of the huge subsidies which would become available when/if they became members of the EU. As a policy advisor, I was trying to help these countries adapt to the new policies, but it was clear that political interests overrode the public interest, and EU rules on transparency were easily circumvented. Despite EU advisors on land privatisation, the actual processes were the preserve of the powers in Govt - i.e. a political party.
1
The audit report referenced in paragraph 8 was issued by the European Court of Auditors (ECA), which is the external auditor of the EU. The internal auditor of the European Commission is its Internal Audit Service (IAS).
1
“They thought they would change us,” said Jana Polakova, a Czech agricultural scientist. “They were not prepared for us.”
Every foreign policy student, shaper and decision maker needs to have this quote tattooed on their foreheads.
3
So subsidies should be abolished. Very similar to the subsidies and tax write offs that oil companies get. Corruption it seems is everywhere. Good investigative article on right wing political groups that are draining the system once again.
2
To anyone familiar with Hungary it has long been known that the EU bureaucracy is not only complicit with a corrupt regime, but has assisted in undermining any attempts to hold Orban and his henchmen accountable. The current system gives thousands of EU bureaucrats power and influence, and without a recipient for the billions in European taxpayer money they dish out that power wouldn’t be there. The money Hungary receives amounts to up to 5 percent of its GDP, and gives Orban the funds to financially control and manipulate the country that he otherwise wouldn’t have.
There has often been talk about getting tougher on Hungary and using the leverage provided by the EU cohesion funds as leverage to enforce compliance with basic principles of good governance and transparency, but the Juncker commission has sabotaged any such attempts - thus undermining the integrity of the European project instead of defending it.
9
Farming in Europe is different from farming in the US.
The inputs are different. Land is much more limited, and so much more costly. They seek and get much higher crop yield per acre, sometimes double the US. They get that by putting in a lot more, more irrigation, more fertilizer, more chemicals, and costly seed varieties. Overall, the "inputs" are much higher.
The expected yields, and costs of crops, are different as a result.
This puts a different light on European policies about farmland, and about the cost of growing on it.
So why does the EU spend so much on subsidy for agriculture? Their farming costs more.
Why do the wealthy and the strong have so much control? Their farming can only be paid for in that way.
It also puts a different light on Western European attempt to buy up the much larger farmlands of the Western Ukraine. For Europe, that struggle is a grab for a new breadbasket for Europe, which if managed in the European way could feed that continent, and also reduce demand for crops from the rest of a land-starved European farm system. Europe wants Ukraine's farmland. Europe's rich and powerful who control its farming wants to buy it up into Europe's system and use.
Ukraine's farmers would be out again. It is not a place for family farms, or poor farmers of the poverty stricken parts of Ukraine. When they figure out what this means for them, they won't like it one bit.
Great reporting on the situation in Hungary.
Have a look at France next, which will receive more than 50,000,000,000 € in CAP funds over the coming 5 year period.
Yet French farmers can't even make costs. Why?
Because multinational distributors have oligopoly power to force down prices and enrich themselves by reselling at higher margins. There's no added value in this set up.
Add this to degressive taxes on fuels and farm equipment and farmers go bankrupt and get bought out by the big ag firms, to establish vertical integration and monopoly power. And the French countryside gets gutted. Whence the Gilets Jaunes.
One could just as well say that France is governed by an elite in service to oligarchs, only they're not necessarily home grown. Who does the Macron/Philippe government truly service?
3
@CL If you are talking elected or unelected elites, bear in mind the European parliament has significant input to less than 20% of EU law.
Everything else is decided by the European Commission and the Council.
Members of the European Parliament (whose expenses cannot, by law, be scrutinised) from countries like Romania, Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Bulgaria must think they have died and gone to heaven.
2
Just a bit of information...
18.4% of households in the U.S. receive SNAP, or food stamps, the funding for which is part of the farm bill. A bigger percentage of the farm bill funds go to SNAP, than to farmers.
The "farm bill" costs taxpayers about $100 billion per year, but 80% of that goes to nutritional programs and FOOD STAMPS, or SNAP, and only $20 billion goes to the farmers.
1
Fantastic article. Land and other means of production "auctioned" (given away) to cronies in post Communist countries is nothing new. This is how class of uber rich was created in Eastern Europe, not only EU member countries. Russian oligarchs who are buying out huge expensive properties in Europe and especially in the US are mostly descendants of the well connected communists. I just wish information in this article spreads all over EU members. I am sure net giving countries (Sweden for example) will be thrilled to know how their funds are being used. Brussels wake up and do something!
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And that's one of the many reasons why the UK is better out of the EU.
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All the bloc program is designed to buy votes for the failing rural communities. That only helps the GOP candidates and must be stopped. The GOP give the Catholics and Evangelicals yearly tax breaks and that is buying votes. As a tax payer i am angered that the the above churches went a whole century without paying any taxes. Remember a country ceases to exist if no one pays taxes. Lets stop that when the Dems get in and make it fair.
We could have a Universal health care and affordable housing if the rich mentioned above only paid there taxes.
1
I am very impressed with NYT’s work on this, including the translation to Hungarian.
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Costas Lapavitsas, an ex Greek MP and Professor of economics at London University has already made the case that the EU is a neo-liberal construct that is unreformable in his book "The Left Case Against the EU".
There are far too many powerful vested interests.
Perhaps Americans might wake up to the reasons why the UK voted Brexit.
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@Soracte the UK left the EU against the interests of its own population. The impending EU anti corruption laws shutting down overseas tax havens were enough for UK's oligarchs to decide what's good for the the peasants. Their organs, the Daily Mail and the Sun peddle their lies with no help from Russian interference, and ingrained herd mentality that resistance is futile does the rest : "Just get it done!"
1
Imagine the benefits the developing world would reap if it were given fair access to rich Western markets, without the protectionist policies European nations put in place. Potentially millions of people would be lifted out of poverty if the world economy were allowed to flourish unimpeded by wealthy nations closing off access.
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These subsidies are one reason why Europe sends tons of milk powder to Africa every year ruining milk market prices and ther
1
This is a fascinating and timely article. I recall being amazed by a good friend of mine who lived in Sofia, Bulgaria, who laughed in my face when I first naively said that EU farm subsidiaries were not an instrument of corruption. He was right, of course, but what I couldn't believe was how widespread the knowledge of rampant EU-funded corruption was in urban communities throughout Sofia.
Anyone and everyone, everywhere I went: 'That's life', they said. 'Under the old system or new, the rich get richer. Nothing changes for us'.
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@Harry S Harry your point is spot on. I was really shocked at how many farmers we met in Hungary or the Czech Republic said, effectively, "I understand that the politically connected are going to get rich. That's the system. I just wish we got a little help, too." People learn to accept a corrupt system over time. It's like the former agricultural minister told us: “Orban didn’t invent the system. He’s just running it more efficiently.”
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@Matt Apuzzo We had a tour guide in Croatia last summer who told us that the Communists were the ones who knew how to work the system, so they are still in charge.
7
@Matt Apuzzo have you listened to interviews with small American farmers? We make Europe look like good guys.
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CAP could be described as a vast 'kick back scheme'. That it has been 'milked' by the original founding members of the EU since its inception has been well known for many years; This explains why there appears to be little appetite in Brussels to tighten controls or reform the management of the policy in ant significant way.
The way the system is taken advantage of in Eastern European countries like Hungary and the Czech Republic is a more blatant and less well refined version of what has been happening in the UK and France and Germany for many years. One way or another the largest slice of the CAP cake goes to those who need it least, the very large land owners. One in five of the biggest recipients of European farm subsidies in the UK are billionaires or millionaires.
Like all powerful and wealthy individuals or corporations, money and power is used to retain and augment money and power through the lobby system which is so entrenched within western 'democratic' nations. This is one of the reasons why the 2015 report that recommended tightening of the farm subsidy rules was dismissed. even though it is glaringly obvious that such reform is long overdue.
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@RHR It is very clear that the EU is not reformable.
One only has to look at the perks enjoyed by Members of the European Parliament (MEPs).
MEPs get a salary of £86,700 a year, subject to a “community tax” rate that can be as little as 12 percent.
Each MEP also gets £3,937 a month (that’s another £47,244 per annum) paid directly into their bank accounts to cover expenses.
They don’t return any unspent cash and they don’t have to provide any receipts.
Believe it or not, the European Court of Justice recently ruled these expenses are private and cannot be subject to any scrutiny.
What else? A very generous pension and health insurance.
And each MEP has up to £256, 600 a year to hire their personal assistants (often family members), and three offices: one in their constituency, one in Belgium and another in France.
These Turkeys are not likely to vote for Christmas.
5
@Soracte , Britain did the right thing by choosing to leave the UK.
1
@Indian Diner , oops. I meant the EU.
1
I recently moved to Austria and I'm grateful for international coverage like this. As a born Los Angeleno, I had NO IDEA this was happening in a country that's now my neighbor. Thank you for making this kind of reporting a priority, because the American parallels are striking.
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I congratulate the NYT on this excellent investigative piece.
The CAP(common agricultural policy) has been beneficial mostly to the founding countries of the EU (Germany, France, etc.). France, for example, will resist most, if not all, efforts to reform the CAP in order to defend its small farmers (which are in fact large agribusinesses). However, the new and not-so-new member states (Hungary, Bulgaria, Slovakia, Czech Republic, etc) were quick learners and are now outdoing their teachers. Since the CAP is being sold to the average European taxpayer, like me, as one of the pillars of the EU, the potential for any meaningful change in the programme is relatively small. There will be some press releases on the issue, but, at the end of the next news cycle, this excellent article will be buried in the “paper mountain” growing out of the EU headquarters.
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@Jack And that's one of the main reasons the UK voted to get out.
1
"Europe’s machinery in Brussels enables this rough-hewed corruption because confronting it would mean changing a program that helps hold a precarious union together."
It is maintained not because it holds this precious, precarious union together, but because it works on a greater scale in spite of the thievery and corruption that goes on in ex-soviet satellite countries and in southern EU to a lesser degree.
Unfortunately, corruption will happen where there is money and opportunity, and addressing it with great reporting is necessary, but let's not throw the baby out just yet.
Addressing corruption and the right-wing populism that wants to hide it under its shadow are battles to be won without sacrificing (too much) what it is that makes our societies work and gives hope to so many people who want a more prosperous and progressive Europe.
1
It is not quite as simple as saying that all corruption is wrong - which it is. If the EU starts to get involved in member state politics then where does it stop? In the UK we have a political elite, a large number of whom went to a small number of fee paying schools. They promote from within their circle. Is this corrupt? The best jobs, particularly in government go to those with the best connections. The UK is becoming increasingly unequal - but by stealth.
Having said that, blatant gangsterism should be subject to international control if the money comes from outside the country in question. But this means that absolute best practice must be developed in the original EU members and these practices then applied across the board. The EU will not do this for fear of uncovering scandals of a different type in France, Belgium, Germany, Italy etc.
3
Quote from the article: "even as the entire system is shrouded in secrecy". Most readers probably don't know what this means or how important it is. The following explains the law in the EU (pushed by the Germans) which creates "secrecy" and consequently protects anyone and everyone who wants to be a criminal. The EU demands that its member states accept "Data Protection Laws" (The UK fought against it but gave in.). This law is exactly the OPPOSITE of the American "Right to Information Act". We all know how much criminals manage to do despite this act. So just imagine countries with "data protection". It's a real free for all for anyone wanting to commit a crime and just as important a real incentive to anyone wanting to commit a crime.
Corruption in Europe will always be able to run rampant due to the "Data Protection Laws" which don't allow authorities to get information about crimes. That's why many authorities in the EU "secretly" depend on the United States for information about terrorists, etc.
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@CC Coit Thanks for this. I'm extremely sensitive to privacy concerns. But I have also seen time and again how governments shield themselves from public accountability in the name of privacy. Interestingly enough, the EU's argument for refusing to provide us with public information in this case was that downloading the data from its computer was just too hard. Seriously.
For some behind-the-scenes info on how we overcame this challenge, I can refer you here.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/03/reader-center/eu-farm-subsidy-reporting.html
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@CC Coit So why is republican corruption currently running rampant in America? Because trump's Soviet style just says 'nyet' whenever anyone asks for, you know, data and information.
C'mon, you're taking a pretty hard look at Europe, without seeing that our founding fathers set up a really really different system designed for a free flow of information.
I hope you're not one of those defending trump's kingly approach to his office; just say no to Congress? In any case, there's no scary secrecy here. The US and the EU work together. It's called law enforcement in the 21st century.
Your assertion that police and investigators in Europe can't get information about crimes is ludicrous and insulting.
4
This is how the EU keeps countries like Hungry in tow, they bribe their leaders by creating a system where corruption can flourish. In turn those leaders use that corruption to silence rivals and maintain power. We, the US continue to do the same thing. We used to get cease fires and favorable trade terms for our money. Now our government has at least attempted to use that money to investigate political rivals. How far we’ve fallen.
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@Josue Azul At least you can read the transcripts to inform yourself. That is not possible in the EU, data protection covers everything. An unfathomable discrepancy to what the Americans have.
And BTW please read the transcript before you make a decision. Be informed first hand and make use of our "Right to Information Act".
1
The EU farm subsidy in this form exists for years. The biggest beneficiaries were and still are the original western members. Hungary and other later entrants were initially restricted and their benefits delayed. It took time for the former eastern block to learn the ropes, that is to emulate France, Belgium and other EU countries.
While Orban is currently out of favor in some circles, agricultural support to anyone exceeds EU military support. Same approach would be beneficial to the US also.
2
Thank you NYT for reporting on this. I understand that this is not a top concern for your readers in the US. However, the EU Commission is turning a blind eye on this for decades. Your coverage sheds light on this. I hope your coverage of this widespread corruption within the EU is read widely in Brussels today.
I do not have the hope that anything will change.
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It's common knowledge, for decades, that those subsidies are unfairly distributed and misused and misspent. Wouldn't it be better to spread those vast sums of money among those who actually produce food, instead of giving it to those who simply own land? I've been wondering about this for a long time. Anybody else got a good idea?
16
In many European countries, being classified as a farmer brings significant tax breaks. The rich therefore buy a piece of land, put their occupation down as farmer and, in addition to the EU handouts, receive tax breaks on all their income, from whatever source.
We will end up with a feudal system just like what the EU was trying to get rid of.
12
I am a supporter of the EU concept. Unfortunately, the EU as it is now structured, is so broken and so out of control that it appears beyond any possible repair. The western European democracies just do things completely different than the new members from the former Soviet bloc.
Reform seems impossible considering every country has veto power. So this experiment has to be destroyed in order to save it. Western EU nations must leave the union en masse. They then must reconstitute the union in a new form and with a new name, hopefully learning from their earlier mistakes. The central and eastern European bloc of nations, now cut off from the western subsidy income that they depend on, will simply wither and die.
7
@Ex New Yorker Having watched the EU squander vast (maybe similar) sums in support of "civil society" in Eastern Europe the years after the Berlin Wall fell, with zero local accountability and Brussels bureaucrats knowingly turning a blind eye, I have to reluctantly agree with you and disagree with the hand-wringing liberal elite here in NYC who moan and groan over "populism" and Brexit.
A different view of this situation is that the EU might want to catch up with the U.S. agribusiness model for food production. Yes, there are problems with industrial agriculture, but there are enormous benefits from it as well. EU (Epicurean Union?) countries may want no part of the American gruel for a reason, but you don't have to eat gruel to grow food more efficiently and thoughtfully.
1
@Dave Oedel
And another view is to subsidize an all-organic approach to farming. The chemically based system is producing catastrophic levels of illness and death among consumers as well as in the animals that feed the people. Hungary heretofore had prided itself on non-gmo farming of corn. In the annals of the corruption detailed in this article, all that “pride” has evidently been swallowed up by the swamp.
1
EU is at a point where it has to go towards either more integration or less. It doesn’t function as it is. More integration would mean a USE, United States of Europe, more central power,central federal bank, central policing agency etc.
The other way is to go towards only a common market or give up the whole European project.
11
"The European Parliament rejected a bill that would have banned politicians from benefiting from the subsidies they administer. And top officials swat away suggestions of fraud."
Two major problems have intersected here. First, when the Soviet Union collapsed, the nominally victorious western countries formulated no plan for helping the suddenly liberated eastern bloc countries to make an efficient and fair transition from authoritarian economic control to some sort of broadly based free market economy. The public assets of collapsed states -- resource, industrial and agricultural -- were gobbled up at rigged or distressed prices by opportunistic corrupt insiders, many being former Soviet functionaries and their allies.
Second, the EU is only a half-accomplished project. It has a common currency and open borders but as yet no union-wide budgetary system nor coherent and effective democratic political control. The power of the EU resides in the Brussels bureaucracy and its power to confer or withhold benefits -- bribe or punish, as the situation allows. The Greeks have been punished and Central European rural oligarchs have been bribed.
The best hope for change is to make the European Parliament into an effective policy making body with a program for EU-wide land reforms. But the citizenry must be organized into cross-border political alliances and demand the necessary changes. The nascent structure exists, but the current fragmented nation-based politics remains myopic.
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@woofer
Part of the Problem is, that the new EU-Members in the east ahve been 'fast tracked' into the EU for geostrategical reasons. From a economical and organisational view, the western members should have consolidated their organisation, before taking new members, on this occassion tightening the anti corruption rules, and shedding the veto mechanisms.
But as the NATO kept the those states at arms length, they sought protoection from Russia in the EU instead.
2
@Misophist
Good point. Thanks. Expediting EU membership was also seen as a way of counteracting the Soviet legacy of corruption, the idea being that interfacing with western institutions would force adoption of more normative procedures.
2
So how is this different than in the US? Where the vast majority of the farm subsidies go to large corporate farms.
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@Rober. The article was about the EU, not a comparative study of agricultural policies worldwide. We get enough whataboutism already.
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@Danny It would, however, help US readers to put EU subsidies into perpective. Any economic data should be comparative to be at all helpful. To what extent is a problem general, to what extent unique to a given area or population? When looking at a problem, it is useful to know ''If it's bad, how bad is it?" It can help an electoral prioritize.
24
@Rober Good question, and US farm policy is certainly worthy of reporting (though not by me since I'm based in Europe). But one important point here: This story isn't about corporate farm interests. It's about corruption, mobsters and the anti-democratic forces that are threatening the EU itself. That, and the fact that the EU spends about 3x as much on farm subsidies as the US each year, make this topic unique.
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Although the investigation is centered on Hungary and the Eastern member states, it would be unfair to assume that the Western member states are free of guilt. The system described in the article had been in existence long before, countries like Spain, Italy, France and Germany are examples of how political parties of all colors consolidated their power by granting access to EU funds to well connected landowners.
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@Dietrich Really? Do you have examples? (Links for instance.) I would not mind reading more about this.
2
@Elisabeth
Yes.
Who gets the largest agricultural subsidy?
The Queen of England.
1
I can recommend the TV series ‘The Gravy Train’ from 1990. It was supposed to be a comedy, but is probably more of a training manual now.
5
"Every year, the 28-country bloc pays out $65 billion in farm subsidies intended to support farmers around the Continent and keep rural communities alive. But across Hungary and much of Central and Eastern Europe, the bulk goes to a connected and powerful few. ... Yet some lawmakers in Brussels who write and vote on farm policy admit they often have no idea where the money goes"
40% of EU expenditures go toward this. That's money that comes from EU taxpayers. And yet, we're all supposed to run around in collective hysteria because people in the UK voted to leave the EU. The remarkable thing is, if the UK ends up not leaving, the same problems that led to the first referendum will still be there. It's not like they'll just dissolve. And the politicians who made it happen (and spent 3 years doing virtually nothing) have not a damndest clue in the world how they'll fix them.
31
Want to know why the GOP has fallen in love w Eastern European autocrats? Because the Republican game plan for the US is the same. Siphon off the nation’s wealth and put it into the hands of the few. Putin and Trump in 2020!
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@Gshaffer429
Those "autocrats" are the democratically elected representatives of the people in those countries. The NYT only thinks a system is democratic, however, if it produces George Soros-style policies.
2
Add to that the "military industrial complex" that is in constant demand for war and billing us with ever-increasing costs for weapons we do not need.
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And Trump just LOVES Orban, who loves.... Putin....and Orban hates Ukraine. Congressman Andy Harris hard right winger and only GOP House member in Maryland LOVES Orban. Keep digging, reporters!
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A large percentage of farm subsidies in most of developing countries including India work in the same way to promote vote bank populist politics that enrich few big farmers and oligarchs, besides political leaders and industries connected to them.
Sugar cane industry and its political lobby in India is a widely studied in that respect. But that practice is not limited to just one crop, sugar cane, or just few areas.
28
Great investigative reporting.
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Farm subsidies should be eliminated, period. The ethanol shell game is the worst one of all.
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In principle; you’re correct. But agriculture is (perhaps unfortunately) an area that no country can allow to succeed or fail on purely “market” terms. If a country’s agricultural sector fails and does not recover, that is a major systemic risk to that country in terms of food security and land use. In an ideal world, only highly efficient and clean agriculture would succeed and would “feed the world”, but with the rise of nationalism around the world, no country can really afford to let their agri sector go to the wall.
Great article though; and a real challenge to the EU, which I hope will deal with it quickly and ruthlessly.
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@peter p: All the field agricultural system failures in Latin America are at the root of the immigration crisis center southern border. I believe US interests, in coffee and bananas have completely wiped out the agricultural sector that would’ve fed the country and stabilized the community.
3
no subsidies for anyone. either you have a viable business or you don’t.
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@Jennifer Freund
Agriculture is not like any other business. Without it, most of the population would starve. Viable or not, it can't be allowed to fail.
This article is not about subsidies to farmers throughout the EU. It is how the post-soviet governments in Eastern and Central Europe, who inherited large parcels of land from the former regimes, and gave them to friends, wealthy supporters and family members, who became rich from the labor of the farmers who tilled the land. The grants from the EU that rightfully belonged to the farmers were subverted to these corrupt oligarchs. This problem evolves from the history of these countries going back to feudal times. This article exposes the injustice of a system that devalues farmers and working people and leads them to a life of endless toil and poverty.
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@Julius Boda the article and your opinion about Hungary is simply wrong. Orban and his wealthy friends bought those lands, is that a crime?, anyone can buy them in the country, same as in other countries. This is about the ownership. Subsidies are old things and they are indeed helping the actual farmers, whether they are the owners or the renters. Subsidies indeed can be claimed by the farmers and them only. I know this because I am a land owner, and I rent it out - since I work elsewhere.
2
@Julius Boda And since large amounts of EU subsidies go toward these countries, then the article is indeed precisely about EU subsidies in the EU.
7
@Julius Boda It’s also about the tractors. The old model emphasized small plots that were managed through the many small tractors that you see in one of the photos. The new model, supported by the EU, emphasizes scale in which a single very large tractor like you see in one of the photos can cover thousands of acres. Modern computer controlled grain storage, huge state of the art (and expensive) machinery, and ‘digital’ agriculture is the future of farming in these nations. It’s necessary to keep them competitive with the huge new farms emerging from Russia and elsewhere.
3
When you allow politicians access to the money bag, they will figure out a way to enhance their personal wealth and that of their contributors. In this case, the EU is to blame for not putting controls on who gets the money. Of course, the system is similar to that in the US with the mega rich farm owners getting most of the government money thru LLC and other hidden ownership schemes.
Until the people rise up, nothing will happen... by then it might be too late --- the Billionaires, Hedge Funds and Oligarchs will rule the world through the bought and paid for politicians and it might be impossible to change.
113
plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose
The article describes what is essentially a continuation of central and eastern European agricultural history with a twist. What I find puzzling is the apparently deliberate indifference of Brussels to the perversion of the system of agricultural subsidies by people bent on destroying the European Union.
Maybe the Brits are onto something. (I don't think so, but I can certainly see where this article offers some solace to Brexiters.)
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@Eric Weissman The CAP is so closely bound up with EU policy and history that if Brussels starts delving in to Hungary, Czech Rep etc, many people would say it should do the same in France, UK, Spain etc, where practices may differ, but the aim is the same: get the subsidies.
I'd say this article gives succour to the cynical to carry on with their MO. Orban and powerful brexiters are no different; blame the EU and other scapegoats for any problem while pocketing millions in EU subsidies by working (and gaming) the system. It works a treat.
A blatant example in the UK is that the ex-editor of brexit supporting Daily mail (and even Dominic Cummings, PM Johnson's key adviser) have received substantial EU subsidies... all the while pushing the most insane nonsensical guff about it, and influencing many farmers (rich and not so) into voting for brexit. This is replicated across the car industry (ie Nissan in Sunderland), pharma or Airbus in Wales etc.
9
Interesting to analyze the (mis)use of U.S. subsidies to farmers in the same way.
We have averaged about $15 billions in annual subsidies in the past two decades.
(Second posting)
52
All subsidies lead to corruption.
Why should farmers, small or large, honest or corrupt, be paid to not grow food or let food that is ready to harvest be left to spoil? We don't pay auto workers to not make cars.
There may have been a time when farm subsidies made sense, but that time has passed. Farming should be just like any other industry and make money from what is produced, not what is not produced.
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@Prodigal Son Your characterization of agricultural subsidies as going for what is not produced is quite inaccurate for agricultural programs in the U.S. for maybe the last 20 or 30 years, at least for the major grains of corn and wheat.
Agricultural subsides that go for what is produced by definition largely will go the the largest producers.
Corn Belt agriculture is now changing so much that I'm not sure U.S. farm bill policy is all that relevant. And for the 2019 corn crop it looks like the main subsidy payment to corn farmers will be this year's Market Facilitation Program, designed to counteract export losses from Trump's trade policies.
18
@Prodigal Son This is a good question, one that came up repeatedly (though EU farm subsidies don't really work the way you describe them). The answer, most governments and many economists will tell you, is that ensuring a stable food supply is a unique national interest unlike car manufacturing. Demand for food is constant. People need to eat. A country has an interest in ensuring it can feed itself, and people have a collective interest (paid for by taxes) in ensuring that they will be fed. So, it is not in a nation's interest to subject farms entirely to the forces of the market and weather. Because unlike manufacturing cars, you can't just build a new farm when the old one goes out of business and becomes a strip mall or a subdivision.
So that's the counterargument. Hope that help.
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@Matt Apuzzo
Land use and zoning laws can be very helpful to keep land available for farms the produce food. I have watched farm after farm go from producing food to hosting Mc Mansions. As the population continues to grow unchecked, we will have less and less land available for farming. Tera-forming like they do in California and Arizona that allows them to grow water intensive crops in arid regions is at the very heart of climate change and the Cali fires.
14
Unchecked bureaucracies with control over money will always tend to be self-serving and secretive to a fault. That's why governments have checks and balances, which however hardly exist in the EU, including transparency. Agriculture subsidies are not the first program in the EU to rely on disguised political connections and, lacking any serious checks or inspection mechanism, are likely to be the last.
21
@Robert The problem with the EU isn't unchecked bureaucracy but unapplied reforms and over-expansion. Admitting Hungary and Turkey and hoping for law-abiding partners was probably too optimistic. The rule of law is never really up to the task of coping with a gangster state.
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@CJ I agree. The article refers to audits. They just don't do anything when fault is found due to the EU's traditional deference to elected governments, which the article also mentions.
I also suspect that subsidies for patronage (the old spoils system) is a problem in the US but it would have been instructive to see comparative data and maybe even a longer comparative series looking at the world's largest economies and their agricultural subsidies.
4
@ CJ Turkey not EU - only in customs union (excluding agriculture). Their accession has gone and will go nowhere.
1