Sicco Mansholt

Sicco Leendert Mansholt was a Dutch farmer, politician and diplomat regarded as one of the founding architects of the Common Agricultural Policy of the European Economic Community. Born in 1908 in Ulrum, Netherlands, he served as the Netherlands' Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food Supplies from 1945 to 1958, the longest tenure in that post in Dutch history, overseeing the reconstruction and modernization of Dutch farming after the Second World War. In 1958 he became the European Economic Community's first Commissioner for Agriculture and First Vice President of the European Commission, positions he held until 1972, during which he built the Common Agricultural Policy from its founding principles and drafted the 1968 Mansholt Plan calling for the consolidation of small farms into larger, more efficient holdings, a proposal that drew sharp criticism from smallholder farmers and from economists such as E. F. Schumacher. He capped his career as the fourth President of the European Commission from 1972 to 1973, before retiring and dying in 1995.