Federal popular initiative "For clean drinking water and healthy food - No subsidies for the use of pesticides and prophylactic antibiotics"

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The federal popular initiative “For clean drinking water and healthy food - no subsidies for the use of pesticides and prophylactic antibiotics” , also known as the “drinking water initiative” for short , is a Swiss popular initiative of the Clean Water for All Association . The initiative demands that only those farms are supported with direct payments or subsidies that do not use pesticides , that do not use prophylactic antibiotics in their animal husbandry and that only keep as many animals as they can feed without importing feed. The Initiative Committee argues that this would make water and food free of drugs , antibiotic- resistant bacteria , pesticides, nitrate and other toxins standard again and affordable for the whole population.

chronology

The initiative was submitted on February 9, 2017. As a result, the Federal Chancellery stated that this corresponds to the legal forms. The start of collection was set for March 21, 2017, and the collection deadline was September 21, 2018. According to the initiative committee, the required 100,000 signatures were collected by October 18, 2017. They were submitted on January 18, 2018 and confirmed on March 1, 2018. The Federal Council requested the Parliament on 14 December 2018 the Drinking Water Initiative people and cantons with no counter-proposal to be recommended for rejection. The National Council did this on June 20, 2019. After the statutory deadline for dealing with the popular initiative by the Federal Council due to the deadline due to the COVID-19 crisis was extended to September 28, 2020, the Council of States will take the initiative in the Treat autumn session in September 2020.

The federal popular initiative “For a Switzerland without synthetic pesticides” , which is related in content, came about in June 2018. Both initiatives during the year 2021 to vote come.

Initiative text

The federal constitution is amended as follows:
Art. 104 para. 1 let. a, 3 let. a, e and g as well as 4
1 The federal government ensures that agriculture makes an essential contribution through sustainable and market-oriented production to:

a. safe supply of the population with healthy food and clean drinking water;

3 It aligns the measures in such a way that agriculture fulfills its multifunctional tasks. In particular, it has the following powers and tasks:

a. It supplements the farmer's income with direct payments to achieve an appropriate remuneration for the services provided, provided that an ecological performance record includes the conservation of biodiversity, pesticide-free production and an animal population that can be fed with the fodder produced on the farm .
e. It can promote agricultural research, advice and training and provide investment aid, provided that it supports agriculture with regard to letters a and g as well as paragraph 1.
G. It excludes farms from direct payments that use antibiotics prophylactically in animal husbandry or whose production system requires regular use of antibiotics.

4 It uses earmarked funds from the field of agriculture and general federal funds, monitors the implementation of the regulations and the effects achieved, and regularly informs the public about the results of this monitoring.

Art. 197 no. 12
12. Transitional provision to Art. 104 para. 1 let. a, 3 let. a, e and g as well as 4
After the acceptance of Article 104 paragraph 1 letter a, 3 letters a, e and g and 4 by the people and the cantons, a transition period of eight years applies.

Attitudes

The supporters of the initiative include the association “Clean drinking water for all” individuals as well as several environmental, nature conservation and animal welfare organizations. Among them are Greenpeace Switzerland, BirdLife Switzerland, Tier im Fokus , Swissveg , the Swiss Anti-Animal Experimentation Group and the Fisheries Association. Pro Natura also supported the collection of signatures . In August 2019, Pro Natura passed the yes slogan.

The drinking water initiative aims to strengthen issues that organic farms have been working on for a long time. That is why it is generally well received at Bio Suisse , but Bio Suisse has not yet come up with a slogan because organic farms could also be affected by the initiative, depending on how it is designed. The unanswered questions from Bio Suisse concern the definition of the term “pesticides” and the determination of the animal population.

Your opponents take position - above all the farmers' association . The farmers' association is particularly critical of the fact that, on the one hand, Swiss agriculture is being weakened, but on the other hand, the expected production losses are being compensated for with imports. As a result, pesticide pollution would simply be outsourced abroad, but Swiss production would become significantly more expensive. SBV President Markus Ritter , CVP National Council, says: “We are all pursuing our goals with clean water and happy cows. The initiative goes way beyond the target. It goes far beyond water and the water problem. " The budget of the farmers' association to combat the initiative is around one million francs. The agricultural cooperative Fenaco (with Landi , Volg etc.) has also joined the alliance of opponents and wants to contribute 200,000 francs to combat the two initiatives (see above ). The Association of Swiss Vegetable Producers (VSGP) will also fight the initiative with all its might. To this end, on January 9, 2019, the association joined forces with the Swiss Fruit Association (SOV), Swisspatat, Swiss Convenience Food Association (scfa) and the master gardener association JardinSuisse to form the Future Plant Protection Union.

Opinion polls

Institute Client date Yes Rather yes Tie
No answer
Rather no No
LeeWas GmbH Tamedia 21./22. June 2018 38 30th 4th 14th 14th

Comments: Figures in percent. The date indicates the middle point in time of the survey, not the point in time when the survey was published.

Web links

Broadcasts of the SRF

literature

Individual evidence

  1. Initiative on the Initiative Committee website, accessed on November 5, 2017.
  2. Swiss Federal Chancellery : Federal People's Initiative "For clean drinking water and healthy food - No subsidies for the use of pesticides and prophylactic antibiotics" - preliminary review , March 7, 2017.
  3. Chronology of the popular initiative , accessed on November 5, 2017.
  4. ↑ The drinking water initiative has over 100,000 signatures. In: BauernZeitung . October 20, 2017. Retrieved November 5, 2017.
  5. "For clean water" initiative submitted against the use of pesticides and antibiotics . In: srf.ch , January 18, 2018, accessed on January 19, 2018.
  6. ↑ The drinking water initiative goes to the polls . In: nzz.ch , March 1, 2018, accessed on March 1, 2018.
  7. Federal Council: Federal Council requests rejection of the “Drinking Water Initiative” , accessed on January 18, 2019.
  8. Parliamentary Services : 18.091 For clean drinking water and healthy food - No subsidies for the use of pesticides and prophylactic antibiotics. Popular initiative. In: Curiavista business database (links to council negotiations and official records). Retrieved August 23, 2020 .
  9. Swiss Federal Chancellery: Federal popular initiative “For a Switzerland without synthetic pesticides” - conclusion , 25 June 2018.
  10. ^ Text of the popular initiative on the Federal Chancellery website
  11. Pro Natura for anti-pesticide initiatives. In: schweizerbauer.ch . August 27, 2019, accessed September 10, 2019 .
  12. Drinking water initiative . In: bio-suisse.ch , accessed on April 27, 2018.
  13. Martin Rufer: "Every purchase determines what agriculture looks like". In: lid.ch , February 26, 2020, accessed on February 26, 2020.
  14. Radical initiative launched - The idealist the farmers fear. In: srf.ch , January 18, 2018, accessed on January 19, 2018.
  15. Angelika Hardegger: Agrarian felt, fake news and an explosive report: The fight for the drinking water initiative has already begun. In: nzz.ch , May 7, 2019, accessed on May 18, 2019.
  16. ^ Adrian Krebs: "We are making a contribution of CHF 200,000 against the plant protection initiatives". In: bauernzeitung.ch. May 16, 2019, accessed May 19, 2019 .
  17. ↑ The drinking water initiative endangers local vegetable growing. In: gemuese.ch, January 18, 2018, accessed on January 21, 2018.
  18. Yves Demuth, Thomas Angeli: Farmers and the federal government against pesticide and drinking water initiative. In: observer.ch . August 28, 2019, accessed August 30, 2019 .
  19. «We are working on crop protection». In: schweizerbauer.ch . September 9, 2019, accessed September 10, 2019 .