Agriculture sat high on the agenda of European policymakers, especially at the time when the Treaty of Rome was being negotiated. The memory of post-war food shortages was still vivid and thus agriculture constituted a key element from the outset of the European Community. The Treaty of Rome defined the general objectives of a common agricultural policy. The principles of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) were set out at the Stresa Conference in July 1958. In 1960, the CAP mechanisms were adopted by the six founding Member States and two years later, in 1962, the CAP came into force.