Marek Výborný has been an MP for the KDU-ČSL since 2017, and preferential votes in the election four years later even placed him at the top of the party ticket. When Zdeněk Nekula resigned as minister of agriculture in June 2023, he was appointed as his successor. He has also recently become the party chair again.
You came aboard when things were already in motion, and the ministry‘s agenda is quite extensive. How challenging was it for you to get your bearings?
I can say without a doubt that the Ministry of Agriculture has one of the most extensive agendas of all the government departments. It covers agriculture, plant and animal production, water management, forests, food quality and safety, as well as specific agendas related to the State Land Offce, the Land Registry, and many other non-governmental organizations and unions. The scope is truly enormous, and I won’t hide the fact that it has been and still is a big challenge for me. To this day, I am trying to grasp various professional matters, but I would like to emphasize that I will never be an expert. The key to my work is having a good team of advisors and experts. That was the advantage I had and that made my start at the ministry easier. I joined a team that is highly knowledgeable and loyal.
After being appointed minister, you published a post on your website in which you wrote about the concept of an open ministry…
The concept of an open ministry is about listening, explaining patiently, and engaging in dialogue. I dare say I am succeeding in fulfilling this concept. After all, I have always prided myself - regardless of whether I was in the position of minister, chairman of the parliamentary group, or grammar school headmaster - on openness and communication. And in my current position, it is becoming clear to me just how important these values are. Communicating with all involved parties, whether they are colleagues from coalition political parties, the opposition, the media, or various non-governmental organizations, is incredibly important to me, as is receiving feedback and making decisions based on critical comments.
Petr Fiala‘s government gets criticized for poor communication. Do you think this is justifed?
I feel like it’s become a cliché. I don’t deny that in the first year or two, we as a governing coalition had some issues with communication. At the same time, I believe that the situation has improved significantly. Of course, you can always find topics that could have been communicated differently, better, more intensively, or to different groups. But as I mentioned in the previous answer, I personally strive to be very open in this regard, which has always paid off. I am convinced that it was partly due to this openness that we were able to handle the turbulent situation in the spring of this year when some farmers repeatedly protested in the streets. You have to be willing to walk among the people, listen to them, maybe even let them chide you, and at the same time patiently explain the possible solutions. We are never able to please everyone, but we help wherever it makes sense.
At the Země Živitelka (Mother Earth) agricultural fair.
Let‘s talk about the recently released Green Report for the past year. What does it reveal, and what problems are farmers facing particularly?
The report is more of a statistical document reflecting the situation in the agricultural sector. As it shows, one of the significant problems is low purchase prices for some commodities, typically grain. The issue here is not Ukraine, but rather a surplus that is significantly driving prices down. The solution is not in my hands as the minister of agriculture, but it must be sought by the farmers themselves. They should consider whether to use the land to grow other crops if they have been facing challenges for two years regarding who to sell the grain to and at what price. However, I believe the situation is not unsolvable, and farmers are already reacting to it. After all, the volume of harvested grain has decreased year-on-year from eight to seven million tons, while our consumption is five million tons. We still have a two-million-ton surplus, but it’s already a third less than in the previous period. The difference is not due to poor harvests but because less land is being sown.
Do you agree that excessive bureaucracy is the biggest problem?
Excessive bureaucracy in agriculture is one of the major problems. We are trying to combat this, and although it's sometimes an uphill battle, I don’t think we’re entirely unsuccessful. In the summer, I had a list compiled of all the anti-bureaucratic measures we've implemented so far, and it came to about seven pages. Sometimes it’s small things like simplifying the application form for investment subsidies, sometimes more extensive, like the amendment to the Veterinary Act, which essentially became an agricultural anti-bureaucratic package. As part of it, we are amending six other laws and trying to simplify things.
Even the general public often discusses the issue of Czechia‘s self-suffciency in terms of individual commodities. To what extent does it make sense to insist on full self-suffciency, if at all?
Rather than food self-suffciency, I would talk about food security. The Czech Republic is not, and will not be, self- suffcient in terms of many commodities, nor does it make sense to strive for it. Here’s one example: we will never be self-suffcient in pork. We have a certain number of farms, and it’s not realistic to open many more. Just imagine if someone wanted to build a pig farm two hundred meters from your house. We are working with certain capacities that we want to stabilize. In other words, we don’t want to reduce the level of self-suffciency, but at the same time, we know that we will never be able to return from less than sixty percent to one hundred. However, there are commodities like milk or beef, where we are fully self-suffcient and are even exporting them. It all fits together. Because we are part of a single European market, or rather the global free trade market, we are not at risk of running out of any commodity.
And food security?
Food security means that in the event of a crisis - be it natural disasters like floods or geopolitical problems - we will be able to fully take care of the population and supply it with basic foodstuffs.
„The Ministry of Agriculture has one of the most extensive agendas of all departments.“ says Marek Výborný.
The report also touches on the issue of improving food quality. How can we support the sale of Czech food, which is often of higher quality than imported, cheaper alternatives?
We cannot dictate to people what and where they should buy - after all, that’s not my role. As the minister of agriculture, I can emphasize - and this is indeed my role - that our food is high-quality, safe, and healthy. This is confirmed by data from the State Agricultural and Food Inspection Authority and the State Veterinary Administration, where the detection rate of harmful substances in food of Czech origin is around eight percent, in food from EU countries about fifteen percent, and in food imported from outside the EU, it’s about thirty percent. For me, this is a clear and undeniable
And food security?
Food security means that in the event of a crisis - be it natural disasters like foods or geopolitical problems - we will be able to fully take care of the population and supply it with basic foodstuffs.
The report also touches on the issue of improving food quality. How can we support the sale of Czech food, which is often of higher quality than imported, cheaper alternatives?
We cannot dictate to people what and where they should buy - after all, that’s not my role. As the minister of agriculture, I can emphasize - and this is indeed my role - that our food is high-quality, safe, and healthy. This is confirmed by data from the State Agricultural and Food Inspection Authority and the State Veterinary Administration, where the detection rate of harmful substances in food of Czech origin is around eight percent, in food from EU countries about fifteen percent, and in food imported from outside the EU, it’s about thirty percent. For me, this is a clear and undeniable proof of the quality and safety of our local food. We are trying to communicate this to the public, for example, through quality labels (Klasa, Regional Food, and others), where the detection rate of problematic foods is even below one percent.
You want to showcase regional foods at Expo 2025 in Osaka. What other plans does the ministry have in connection with the exhibition?
The Czech national pavilion at Expo 2025 will be a unique wooden structure, which I believe has the potential to become one of the highlights of the entire global exhibition. Together with the organizers and our commissioner general Ondřej Soška, we agreed that the wood for the pavilion would be sourced from Czech forests. We want to demonstrate that wood is the building material of the future. As part of our Wood Raw Materials Policy, which we approved and published in May this year, we aim to achieve some goals, such as increasing the share of wooden buildings in the total volume of residential houses to 25 percent by 2030.
At the Země Živitelka (Mother Earth) agricultural fair with South Bohemian Region Governor Martin Kuba, President Petr Pavel and his wife Eva.
That‘s quite an ambitious plan…
It is a challenging goal, but I believe it’s achievable. While wooden houses made up only 1.4 percent of the total number of residential buildings in 2000, by 2022, this figure had risen to 14.1 percent. We would like to get closer to neighboring countries like Austria or Germany, but we are also aware that we will never be able to compare ourselves to Scandinavian countries, where wooden houses make up about ninety percent of all residential buildings. In this regard, the ministry is leading by example - all newly constructed operational buildings of the Forests of the Czech Republic are wooden buildings. Our internal ministry guidelines will now also state that wood is the preferred building material.
Agrovoltaic power plants are also a new development…
We defined agrovoltaics for the first time in the Agricultural Land Protection Act as one of the segments of renewable energy sources, and we are currently finalizing, in cooperation with the Minister of the Environment Petr Hladík, a directive that will combine agricultural activities with electricity production. I would like to emphasize that agrovoltaics is not a photovoltaic facility on land, fields, or grasslands. Agrovoltaics is the combination of agricultural activities and electricity production from renewable sources. In the first phase, agrovoltaics will be used in orchards, vineyards, or hop fields, where solar panels can serve as a source of shade or protection against hail, and the electricity can be used by local consumers. However, this is nothing groundbreaking - similar systems are used, for example, in Switzerland or Germany.
Is our agriculture sustainable, modern, and competitive?
It absolutely is. We support science and research, agricultural education, contribute to the purchase of modern technologies in agriculture, and have measures in place for young farmers. Our agriculture has great potential, and many skilled people are working in the industry. It is a very honest job that requires a lot of responsibility as well, and I am grateful to our farmers for their efforts.
PRIORITIES
The year 2025 will once again be an election year. That would Marek Výborný still like to achieve in his department before then? “We only have a year left, which greatly limits our opportunities. But I would like to mention two things,” he says. “First, it is the completion of the amendment to the Forest Act and the Hunting Act – laws that are absolutely crucial for the future of Czech forests, landscape, and nature. And then there is the update of the strategic goals for agriculture 2030+. At the moment, we are dealing with comments from non-governmental organizations, we have meetings with MPs and senators ahead of us, and at the turn of the year, we would like to have this ‚roadmap’ for Czech agriculture approved by the government. It is an important document, based on which we will hold an in-depth debate on what European agriculture should look like in the future, and I would like the Czech Republic to be active in this regard.”
CV BOX
Marek Výborný (born July 10, 1976, in Heřmanův Městec) is the minister of agriculture and an MP. He is also a member of the Heřmanův Městec Municipal Assembly, former member of the Pardubice Regional Assembly, and chair of the KDU-ČSL.
He graduated in history and theology from the Palacký University in Olomouc. In 2001, he started teaching history, social studies, and Latin at the Pardubice Grammar School, going on to serve as its headmaster from 2012 to 2018.
Výborný has been a member of the KDU-ČSL since 2015. In 2017, he was elected an MP and later chair of the KDU-ČSL, stepping down after the death of his wife in 2019. He was elected chair again this October. Following the 2021 election, he became the chair of the KDU-ČSL parliamentary group.
He likes to ride his bike on the roads and in the nature of the Iron Mountains and the Polabí region. He serves as an acolyte in his home parish of Heřmanův Městec and is an active member of the Czech Christian Academy. He also works as the chair of the Church of St. Bartholomew Musical Summer festival organizing committee. He is a member of the choir Vlastislav and a Scout troop. His father is the ex-minister of defense and Constitutional Court judge Miloslav Výborný.
He cares for three children.
