The Adaptation of the Polish Agricultural and Food Law to the Legal Standards of the European Union

The process of the normative adaptation of the Polish agricultural law to the law of the European Union was started relatively not long ago, and its development is dated at the turn of the years 1999/2000. In the sphere of the problems of agricultural and food law a large part of the past decade was devoted by government and non-government organisations to investigate the assumptions of the Common Agricultural Policy of the European Union. These actions concerned the working out of a position for future negotiations about membership with the European Union. The Polish political elites and Polish legislation moreover face a number of challenges concerning the undertaking of normative solutions concerning improvement of the agricultural structure. The carried out analysis of the process of adaptation of the Polish agricultural and food law to the standards of the European Union indicates the forming of a definite specificity of the legislative process. Adaptation of the Polish law to the European standards must take place in accordance with principles of the obliging Constitution of the Republic of Poland and must be in accordance with the rules of functioning of a democratic state of law. The presented in this article process of the adaptation of the Polish agricultural and food law to the standards of European law will proceed still for a long time. Thus formulation of final remarks about a process which has not been ended is a risky task. There still exists a number of unknowns referring to scenarios concerning the determination of rights and duties which the agriculture of countries applying for membership will obtain at the moment of enlarging the European Union. In spite of delays connected with the process of adaptation and the sometimes occurring deviations the accepted or draft legal regulations are in the majority compatible with the Union law. Bringing Poland closer to the legislation of the European Union has not only a normative dimension, but also a civilisation one, which will allow to integrate the Polish society, including farmers and producers of food, with the common social-economic organism of the united Europe which is the European Union.