Exceptional measures announced on 22 April, as a further response to the Coronavirus crisis include granting private storage aid, flexibility for market support programmes and exceptional derogation from EU competition rules. To lighten the burden of the coronavirus crisis laying on the shoulders of producers and the dairy industry and not to recreate a "mountains of milk", a voluntary volume reduction scheme at EU level should be proposed which will help reducing the pressure on the milk prices. According to European Committee of the Regions (CoR), producers will have to be given enough compensation per litre of milk they do not produce, in order to face economic consequences.

The European Committee of the Regions' NAT commission began its new term of office with a debate on Coronavirus and its impact on local communities with the World Health Organisation. At the meeting on 5 March, members also adopted an opinion on forestry and discussed on cross-border healthcare, sustainable tourism and food policy. Rural development, the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), fisheries, forestry, food production and public health are amongst the key topics on the Commission for Natural Resources (NAT) agenda for this new mandate.

The chairs of the six policy commissions of the European Committee of the Regions were elected on 13 February, the last day of the inaugural plenary of the Committee's 2020-25 mandate.