Europe’s crisis reserves weren’t meant for this kind of drought

 

Europe’s crisis reserves weren’t meant for this kind of drought

Dry seasons have become a fixture of European farming. The EU’s crisis tools still treat them as a surprise.

 

August 7, 2026 10:00 am CET

By Bartosz Brzeziński and Agnes Rønberg

https://www.politico.eu/article/europe-crisis-reserve-agriculture-drought-climate-change/

 

The rain stopped in spring and never came back. From France to Czechia, this summer's harvest is withering — and depleting aid funds built for one-off disasters, not a crisis that returns every year.

 

Climate change has made dry seasons so frequent in Europe that the aid has become routine, too: national rescue packages, topped up by EU money. Nearly all of it covers what farmers have already lost; very little goes toward surviving the next one.

 

For all the money the EU spends on farming, none of it is guaranteed to farmers when drought hits. Every rescue is improvised, decided one at a time. And the European Commission says it can’t afford a standing fund unless capitals pay in more, which none have offered to do.

 

In Czechia, just 32 millimeters of rain fell across March and April — the driest spring in more than 60 years. The heat that followed pushed field temperatures past 50 degrees Celsius. “In some cases maize fields are failing to produce anything which can be used as fodder for animals,” said Jan Doležal of the Agrarian Chamber of the Czech Republic farm lobby. He hoped the EU would pay out for the damage in the fall.

 

How to respond to that cycle — damage first, compensation later, repeat next season — is one of the disputes running through the negotiations on the EU’s next long-term farm budget.

 

One flashpoint is a small emergency fund inside that post-2028 budget, reserved for when markets crash — collapsing prices, gluts of cheap imports, disease outbreaks. It can pay for weather damage, but only when the Commission decides to allow it, case by case. Most governments in the drought belt want ruined harvests written in as a standard trigger.

 

The Commission's answer: No realistic amount of euros would cover the damage.

 

"Even 900 million” would amount to just “peanuts,” Agriculture Commissioner Christophe Hansen told reporters in July. While that figure represents the Commission’s proposal to double the current crisis cache, he noted,  “if we have to take everything on board what [countries] are asking, it would be ridiculously low.”

 

Dry belt

The EU's own drought maps show the worst of it cutting straight through the middle of the Continent.

 

In Hungary, where this summer's harvests are coming in 10 to 20 percent below the five-year average, the agriculture ministry said the tools simply haven't kept up with the changing climate. Emergency aid and insurance need rebuilding for a hotter Europe, the ministry said in a statement, with more EU money behind them, so farmers get help "faster and more predictably."

 

Together with six other countries in the dry belt, Hungary backed a declaration in June demanding a list of changes to the emergency fund's successor.

 

Those countries — Poland, Czechia, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Croatia and Romania — want it to cover weather damage; pay out when a farmer loses a fifth of a crop rather than a third; and provide the money before the paperwork clears. As things stand, they wrote, "relief comes too late."

 

Commissioner Hansen wants the money to go toward longer-term solutions, rather than purely padding out farmers’ losses. Ideas include irrigation and water infrastructure to blunt the damage and an insurance push with the European Investment Bank so that bad years are covered by premiums rather than emergency funds.

 

But “we will never find enough money,” he said, unless richer EU countries put more into the bloc’s joint budget. So far, those countries are pushing for the pot to be reduced instead.

 

Spending strategy split

Not all countries suffering drought are in favor of easier access to emergency cash.

 

In France, the heat struck just as the corn flowered, and no grain formed. By mid-July, growers were mowing the plants down for animal feed. The industry expects its smallest corn crop in at least a quarter-century — down 30 percent in a single year. However, the country’s agriculture ministry said the EU’s crisis money should stay what it is: a tool for market shocks. Climate risk, the ministry said in a statement, belongs with dedicated instruments like subsidized crop insurance.

 

For Polish Agriculture Minister Stefan Krajewski, emergency cash and tools designed to manage longer-term risk are complementary. "One shouldn't be completely replaced by the other," he said.

 

Among farm groups, the pushback is less about prevention itself than about how it’s implemented: Farmers ordered into new practices, versus being paid to adopt them.

 

In Germany, the Rhine has dropped so low that cargo ships sail half-loaded, driving up the cost of moving grain and feed. The German Farmers Association backs the shift toward prevention and adaptation — as long as it comes with “investment,” said chief Stefanie Sabet, “not obligation.”

 

Clea Caulcutt contributed to this report from Paris.