EU budget subsidies in areas such as agriculture, fisheries, cohesion policy, transport and energy should be phased out if they are likely to have environmentally harmful effects according to a detailed assessment. This is the conclusion of a Parliament's Environment Committee study that was published in March 2011. Ruta Landgrebe and Dr. Ralph Piotrowski of Ecologic Institute contributed the sections on Agriculture and Fisheries to this study. The report is available for download.

The report provides an overview of the environmental relevance of the largest fields of expenditure within the EU budget. It assesses the sustainability level of key budget items in the EU sectoral policies. It also provides recommendations in the context of a potential reform of subsidies that would contribute to the alignment of the EU budget towards a more sustainable growth as called in the EU 2020 Strategy.

The European Commission plans to put forward budget reform proposals in June 2011.

The study [pdf, 2.5 MB, English] is available for download on the European Parliament website.