The Economic, Social, and Environmental Determinants for the Agricultural Output in Some European Union Countries - The Agricultural Economics of the 21st Century - page 49

Chapter 5
The Economic, Social, and Environmental
Determinants for the Agricultural Output
in Some European Union Countries

V ´ tor Jo ˜ o Pereira Domingues Martinho

1 Introduction

Nowadays, the reality in the agricultural sector among the several countries of the
European Union is very different. Presently the European Union constitutes of
28 different countries ranging from Eastern to Western Europe, with significantly
diverse histories and traditions.
For example, the ten countries which became members of the European Union in
2004, the frequently named countries of central and oriental Europe, had, in large
part, a history marked by an economic and political strategy which differed greatly
from those verified in other European countries.
Other countries in Western Europe, such as Portugal for example, until 1974,
had a history influenced by other economic and political orientations that the
society referred to many times as nondemocratic regimes.
The orientations followed in Eastern Europe, as well in the west, had several
effects upon different economic sectors, namely in the agricultural sector. These
strategies, frequently with policies, known as those of the “proud and alone,” were
conducive to situations of low technical development, low competition, and drastic
consequences for farming factors of production, such as the exhaustion of soils.
The agricultural policies of the European Union, namely those from the Com-
mon Agricultural Policy (CAP), often do not take into account these diverse
realities in European countries. Some countries when they adhered to the
European Union had many problems, as referred to before, with the dynamics
and development of the agricultural sectors, and needed a CAP that helped with
the improvement of the performance of their farming contexts. In contrast, these
countries adopted a CAP that in general since 1992 was aimed to reduce production
and extending, partly due to some problems related with the excess of production,