European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen took the floor this morning, in front of the European Parliament in Strasbourg for her yearly State of the Union address. The speech is meant to set the political tone and priorities for the coming year. And it laid bare a troubling reality: food systems transformation and animal welfare were missing.
Von der Leyen’s framing was geopolitical: Europe’s “independence moment” against the backdrop of Russia’s war in Ukraine, turmoil in the Middle East, and shifting global alliances. She cast the Union as a capable global actor to be taken seriously on the world stage, shaping rather than reacting to crises.
But while she pledged to strengthen Europe’s autonomy in energy, defense and technology, the same urgency was glaringly absent when it came to food, farming and nature. Her few words on agriculture reduced the sector to a matter of competitiveness. Farmers, she said, are weighed down by prices, bureaucracy and unfair competition. The cure? “Simplification”! A familiar Brussels buzzword that, in practice, too often means deregulation. Cutting red tape might sound harmless, but it risks stripping away rules designed to safeguard the environment, protect animals and ensure long-term resilience in food and farming.
Von der Leyen promised to “strengthen the position of farmers in the food chain” through a review of unfair trading practices and ringfenced income support in the next budget. She floated a vague “Buy European Food” campaign, alongside a defense of controversial trade agreements with Mercosur and the United States. These gestures may appease short-term anger, but they sidestep the structural question: how can Europe’s food systems transition toward sustainability if the Commission keeps treating agriculture purely as an industry to be shielded, rather than a sector that must transform to protect animals, ecosystems and climate?
While the President’s morning speech completely omitted animals, ecosystems, and serious climate framing, her official letter of intent – published the same day – does at least include a “livestock strategy including elements on animal welfare”. But that quiet mention rings hollow next to the simplification agendas dominating both speech and draft legislation. A token gesture on paper cannot compensate for the absence of a serious, public commitment in front of Parliament and European citizens.
Civil society has warned repeatedly: simplification must not become a vehicle for dismantling protections won over decades. Robust rules are not obstacles but drivers of innovation, fairness and resilience. By chasing short-term political calm and neglecting the long-term health of our food and farming systems, the Commission undermines the very autonomy and competitiveness it claims to defend.
Europe does indeed need a strong Union, a strong Commission with a strong agenda on the transition toward sustainability. But that strength will not come from watering down protections or ignoring animals and nature. If sustainability is to be Europe’s chance for independence, competitiveness and resilience, it requires concrete measures on agriculture, animal welfare and food transition, not empty words dressed up as simplification.