The European Union and the integration of sustainable development goals into community policies: the Common Agriculture Policy (CAP)

The Common Agriculture Policy (CAP) has been, for a long time, the main Community policy and, at present, it constitutes one of the main expenditure items (36.7%) of EU budget. In 2015, the United Nations adopted a new global development policy based on 17 sustainable development goals (SDGs) to be achieved by 2030, in accordance with the views of 2030 Agenda. As consequences of this, all Countries have to adapt their activities to the new general framework of 2030 Agenda, that is to integrate the SDGs under the internal policies. European Union and their policies, CAP first, must move in this direction. In the last 25 years, CAP was subjected to numerous reforms. According to these reforms, the nature of CAP has been changed, but, most of the problems of the past, have not been removed. CAP remains problematical, especially as regards the distribution of financial supports, social inclusion, sustainability and food security. All these aspects are of prime importance for the purpose of adapting to the new set 2030 Agenda goals of environmental, social and economic sustainability. A new revision of CAP is currently underway and should be concluded by 2020, so that, it could be implemented from the beginning of the new financial perspective period (2021-2028). The aim of this paper is to verify if the PAC review process, currently underway, could be able to achieve the new global development targets.