ABSTRACT
This chapter analyses European Community decision-making in the second half of 1990. After the Houston G7 summit and the July meeting of the Trade Negotiations Committee had set the scene for the final phase of the Uruguay Round, the European Communities' (EC's) Commissioner for Agriculture, Ray MacSharry, took the initiative for a quantified EC offer for reducing agricultural support. In early October this resulted in a formal Commission proposal, which was discussed in the Council of Ministers with intensity unprecedented in EC decision-making on the Uruguay Round. After meeting seven times, and in different compositions, the Council agreed on the EC's agricultural offer, which was the EC's contribution to the Heysel conference in Brussels. On the eve of the ministerial conference in the Heysel conference centre in Brussels, as 30,000 angry farmers gathered to protest in Brussels, there was a joint meeting of EC Trade and Agriculture Ministers.
