Celebrating 50 years of the Special Committee on Agriculture (SCA)
The Special Committee on Agriculture (SCA) is 50 years old and this is being celebrated. The Flemish chairman of the SCA is inviting current and former representatives of the member states and EU institutions for a combined lunch and musical event.
On 12 May 1960 the SCA was founded by a resolution from the Council of the European Union. It held its first meeting on 9 September 1960. The SCA acts as the counterpart for Coreper I for the dossiers that are framed by the two pillars of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP).
The proceedings of the Agriculture and Fisheries Council are prepared in advance by 12 working parties, spanning 45 subdivisions. The dossiers are then studied either by Coreper or by the Special Committee on Agriculture (SCA), before being forwarded to the Council. Coreper usually deals with fisheries and food safety issues and agri-budgetary questions. The SCA was established to cover the highly technical nature of dossiers concerning agricultural markets and rural development.