(IT) Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, guaranteeing animal welfare is a moral obligation, as well as a civic duty towards our four-legged friends who bring love and affection into our lives, but also towards all those animals destined for commercial purposes. For this reason, we must adopt strict controls on farms and in the trafficking of animals of affection, so as to avoid any form of abuse a
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Geographical Indications for wine, spirit drinks and agricultural products (debate)
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, 890 geographical indications including food, wine and spirits: With this data, Italy is the first European country for PDO and PGI certified products, which have a value of more than 20 billion euros in total. Thanks to this regulation, we will protect our producers more, especially against counterfeiting, and finally ensure that our cultural, gastronomic and lo
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, regencies and deputies awaiting the desired chair: this is the fate of many, too many teachers who, still in 2024, have to deal with precarious working conditions, unattractive wages, exhausted rankings, episodes of burnout that risk having repercussions on students and an understandable crisis of vocation among young people. Teachers and principals are lacking
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Multilateral negotiations in view of the 13th WTO Ministerial Conference in Abu Dhabi, 26-29 February 2024 (debate)
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, fisheries subsidies: This was the focus of the previous WTO conference. Noble intentions, especially in the fight against IUU fishing, on which we all agree that an iron fist must be adopted. But a big spectrum on the horizon: the end of tax breaks on fuel for fishing vessels. For many years, our fishermen have been threatened by this sword of Damocles and the r
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EU Action Plan: protecting and restoring marine ecosystems for sustainable and resilient fisheries (debate)
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, the end of bottom trawling is what Europe is calling for in the action plan. The understandable protests of the European navies and the sound of the sirens of the more than 7 000 boats that are in danger of ceasing to operate do not seem to have reached your ears, dear Commissioner. What else do fishermen have to do to be heard? Why do you continue with proposal
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Implementation of the Common Fisheries Policy and future perspectives (debate)
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, it was 2013 when the common fisheries policy was quickly reformed. In the last ten years we have gone from a total lack of objectives for fisheries management to political, if not electoral, objectives, which in some cases are impossible to achieve or extremely difficult to put into practice. The result is fishermen's distrust of politics and of the European Uni
(IT) Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, more than 700 companies at risk, devastating repercussions on thousands of jobs and a negative impact on more than 30% of Italy's GDP: These are just some of the effects of this absurd regulation for Italy, which has achieved a recycling rate of 73.3%, nine years before the target set by the European Union. Yet the efforts made by Italian companies would no
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Sustainable use of plant protection products (debate)
Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, that is the ideology, that is what moved the majority of this Parliament when it adopted drastic reductions in the use of plant protection products, which are even more restrictive than those proposed by the Commission. The rapporteur has rejoiced and who knows if she will do the same when she realises that she has put the entire agricultural supply chain at
Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, everything changes so as not to change anything. I congratulate the Commission and the Council on having completely wasted four years of negotiations. In this regard, I would like to know where the Commissioner is tonight. We had to give fisheries a leaner and easier-to-implement control regulation. Instead, we will have twisted and punitive rules, more burea
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The proposed extension of glyphosate in the EU (debate)
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, glyphosate yes or glyphosate no? For years, the European Union has been questioning this substance, and with every deadline and renewal we find ourselves reopening a debate that touches on different economic and public health spheres. Member States that choose to authorise glyphosate do so with requirements for thresholds and how to respond to environmental and
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, as a representative from Venice, I too must remember the victims of the tragic accident that took place last night in Mestre. They were thirty-five foreign tourists returning from a day's visit to Venice, when the bus crashed from an overpass, catching fire. Twenty-one people have died, including two children and the driver from Treviso, and more than fifteen pe
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Medicine shortages and strategic healthcare autonomy in the EU (debate)
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, we do not have enough medicines in the European Union. For twenty years now, the costs of these structural deficiencies have been paid by the citizens, who only in Italy suffered the total absence of almost 900 drugs last winter. These are numbers that must make us reflect not only on the shortage of drugs, but also on dependence on third countries. This is why
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Rising precariousness in Europe including the need for aid to the most deprived (debate)
(IT) Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, the recent energy crisis and galloping inflation are hitting European households hard, not just those in the weakest strata. In the European Union, it is estimated that one in three households struggles to make ends meet; In Italy, this figure drops to one in two families. This is why we need to act urgently and do so on several levels, to concretely addres
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Towards a more disaster-resilient EU - protecting people from extreme heatwaves, floods and forest fires (debate)
(IT) Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, I still hear the sound of hail in Veneto, Friuli Venezia Giulia and Trentino-Alto Adige last July: ice grains so large as to fill the palm of one hand and devastate cars and cultures; gusts of wind such as to uncover roofs and uproot trees; people and animals injured by the impetus of bad weather. And how to forget the flood that hit Emilia-Romagna... A rea
Madam President, the ambition and objectives of this directive were known from the outset. Too bad that the result was not fully in line with expectations. We all want to protect the health of our citizens, considering the importance that water has in our lives and uses in agriculture and industry. With the new directive, data will be available to citizens. And this, along with updating definition
Madam President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, rejected in the PECH Committee, rejected in the AGRI Committee, rejected in the ENVI Committee and, it would seem, the fourth comes by itself. And in this case, that is what we are asking of this plenary. Once again, hoping that it will be the last, we aim to reject a regulation that damages productive activities, hiding behind the noble intent
Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, I would like to recall the girl who died from the flames in a fire the other day here in Brussels. I know you cannot ask for a minute's silence, but I wanted to join all those young people who move here to Europe to build this Union and give importance to what is a great meaning for us. So I ask for a minute's silence, if possible.
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Protecting and restoring marine ecosystems for sustainable and resilient fisheries - Agreement of the IGC on Marine Biodiversity of Areas Beyond National Jurisdiction (High Seas Treaty) (debate)
Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, I will be direct: We don't like this action plan. And I tell you this by showing you a piece of net that our fishermen use for trawling in Italy: Do you see the size of the shirts? Do you know that the impact on the bottom of our train is not like the one outside the EU? Did you hear the sirens of the fishermen who demonstrated in Europe the other
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, to support European farmers and consumers: this must be the European Union's priority in the face of the food security threats brought to light by the conflict in Ukraine. The shortage of products and fertilisers, which we have witnessed over the past year, has underlined the need to strengthen European food production and sovereignty. That is why, as rapporteur
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Small-scale fisheries situation in the EU and future perspectives (debate)
Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, the right direction is the path taken by this report where we have all worked, showing that when we join forces, good agreements are reached. Small-scale fishing is the heart of European fishing and embodies the deepest values and traditions. It is a sustainable fishing, more selective and less polluting, carried out with sacrifices and passion of our fisherm
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Towards equal rights for persons with disabilities (debate)
Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, we are recently witnessing a newfound and unanimous awareness on the subject of disability, as evidenced by the numerous legislative proposals and the increasingly frequent institutional debates. It is clear, however, that all this is not enough and it must be said clearly. There are too many obstacles that prevent people with disabilities from actively parti
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Commission implementing Regulation (EU) 2022/1614 of 15 September 2022 determining the existing deep-sea fishing areas and establishing a list of areas where vulnerable marine ecosystems are known to occur or are likely to occur (debate)
Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, a precedent. We are concerned about this regulation, not only because of the reasons expressed just now by our fellow Members, but also because it may set a precedent for other seas. I am thinking, for example, of the Mediterranean Sea or my Adriatic Sea, where banning trawling would be detrimental to our fishing companies and our economy. Fisheries managemen
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Global food security as follow-up to the G20 Agriculture Ministers meeting (debate)
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, a few months: This is enough time to bring down global food security. The war in Ukraine, the global shortage, the general panic. With a knock-on effect, the great powers began banning agricultural exports. China, India, Malaysia and the United States have decided to protect themselves against those who, like the European Union, relied on these products. In fact
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Question Time (Commission) Tackling depopulation through cohesion policy instrument
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, Commissioner Ferreira, the phenomenon of depopulation is leading remote and mountainous areas to attract and retain fewer and fewer people. This is because until now these areas have not had the necessary support and the right tools to prevent this escape. It is clear that if the population and especially young people do not have access to services, employment a
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Consequences of drought, fire, and other extreme weather phenomena: increasing EU's efforts to fight climate change (debate)
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, extreme weather events and natural disasters are becoming more frequent. In Italy, for some years now, we have been witnessing waves of bad weather that cause enormous damage: environmental damage with damaged trees, rivers and landscapes; economic damage, with entire crops ruined and crops compromised, with businesses to be cleaned up, sometimes to be rebuilt i