This document discusses EU farm subsidies and budget transparency. It notes that the EU spends €55 billion per year on farm subsidies. However, there is little transparency around how this money is spent. The document advocates for greater use of freedom of information requests and investigative reporting to shed light on spending and promote more informed public debate and policymaking. It provides an example of one organization's efforts to obtain and publish subsidy data from 27 different EU websites to increase transparency.

1. Follow The Money:
Budget Transparency the EU Way
re-publica
16 April 2010
Jack Thurston
Co-founder, farmsubsidy.org

3. If citizens knew how the
EU spends €55 billion a
year on farm subsidies...
Would they approve?

4. Our method
Freedom of
information Good stories
+ +
Beer
Investigative Public debate policy
reporting

6. 6 | | BUSINESS Business & Media |
21.05.06
CASH COWS
WHAT IT COSTS THE TAXPAYER TO DESTABILISE DAIRY MARKETS
British export subsidies, by Export subsidy granted, by company, 2004 and 2005
destination country, 2004 and 2005
Fayrefield
Foods* £22,149,818
Philpot Dairy
Products £21,957,002
SAUDI Dale
ARABIA Farm* £19,391,504
£2,147,003
INDIA
£1,244,914 Nestle
UK £7,442,672
JA N
APAN
UAE BANGLADESH £1,24 273
£ 44,2
ALGERIA £6,016,605 £3,479,499
£9,413,948
TMC Dairies
EGYP
YPT (NI) £6,421,069
MEXICO £3,03 340
,031,340
£7,714,200
PH IPPINE
PHILIP NES
JAMAICA
JA AICA £1,7 ,901
,708,9
£2,296,9 7
£2 296,987 OMA
OMAN Hoogwegt
£4,660,97
,660,973 International £6,016,872
SUDAN THAILA D
HAILAND
IVORY COAST
IVO £3,906,970 £6 06,805
£6,706,80
VENEZUELA £5,722,515
722,515 Lakeland Dairies
£2,274,752 (NI) £4,863,754
NIGERIA
£11,782,308 IND
INDONESIA
ESIA
£2,94 8
£2,947,118
Eilers & Wheeler
Sales £4,009,257
Meadow
Foods £3,335,750
KEY F Uhrenholt
Dairy £3,084,188
*includes subsidiaries
£1 to £4m £4 to £7m £7m+
£0m 5 10 15 20
GRAPHIC: CATH LEVETT PHOTOGRAPH: ALAMY SOURCE: FARMSUBSIDY.COM
Who’s creaming off EU subsidies?
Exports of cheap European dairy products are crushing the livelihoods of developing world farmers, writes Heather Stewart
ritish-based exporters, including known as the EU ‘butter mountain’ cow is one of the most reliable ways of on behalf of the EU, said Britain would
Nestle and Dairy Crest, have (‘wine lakes’ were another manifestation Peter Mandelson lifting yourself out of poverty,’ says like to see them abolished.
claimed £126m of taxpayers’ of the same problem). But after a barrage agreed to Europe Thurston, who is trying to compile a ‘We would prefer that export refunds

10. EU Budget, 2007-2013
Admin
Jobs, growth, 6%
security, justice,
foreign policy,
overseas aid,
43% Farm subsidies
climate, energy, 51%
environment,
R&D, science &
innovation...

11. Photo: NASA

12. Photo: Laura Leon / IHT

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17. Top 18% of recipients
get 85% of the money

18. “In conclusion, the
current system fails to
deliver value for Through
taxpayers’ money” the green
smokescreen
BirdLife International,
November 2009 How is CAP cross compliance
delivering for biodiversity?

20. Behind the headlines

26. European Transparency
Initiative

27. That’s 27 websites to
screen scrape!
(even though the European Commission
possesses all the data itself)

32. Governments

33. ✔ Name
✔Municipality
✔ Amount

34. ✘ Business ID
✘ Geodata
✘ Schemes

35. A few lessons
learned

36. Thanks for listening!
Jack Thurston
Co-founder, farmsubsidy.org
jack@farmsubsidy.org