Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2002-09-24-Speech-2-227"
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"en.20020924.10.2-227"2
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".
Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, I should first like to express my warm thanks to the honourable Members for making it possible, for the first time, for us to debate next year's budget in Parliament even before the formal procedure begins. As far as agriculture and rural development are concerned, I am pleased to see that a series of the amendments adopted by the Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development call for the appropriations in heading 1a to be restored to the level proposed by the Commission in its preliminary draft budget, and that there is a desire to reverse the cuts made across the board by the Council.
The third issue is the impact of the reform on the budget, which will, by and large, be modest. The only proposal was to increase the scrapping fund by EUR 32 million. This would have an impact on the 2003 budget. The main problem with this fund is not its size but the budgetary framework. Here too the Commission has made a proposal in the letter of amendment to use the flexibility instrument.
On the issues raised by Mr Graefe zu Baringdorf in connection with export subsidies, I can only make proposals on the basis of existing legislation. I cannot work on the basis of possibilities that might arise at some point in the future. As far as codecision for compulsory expenditure is concerned, this question first needs to be referred to the Convention. It would require the Treaties to be amended accordingly. Only then would it be possible to meet your request, but I should like to stress that the Commission shares the view that in future, agricultural policy and fisheries policy should be included under the codecision procedure.
I explicitly welcome the reinstatement of these appropriations and should like in addition to underline that the Commission's PDB had already provided for a margin of EUR 2.26 billion below the financial perspective ceiling that was set in Berlin. As you know, at the end of October the Commission will be tabling a letter of amendment to the PDB for the EAGGF Guarantee Section so as to take account of the very latest macroeconomic forecasts and recent legislative developments.
Today it is certainly still too early to quantify precisely the changes that could be proposed, but I can tell you which factors will be taken into consideration. Firstly, the devaluation of the US dollar compared with the euro will mean an increase in commitment appropriations, in particular for export refunds and some other payments. Secondly, the market situation in a number of sectors has unfortunately not improved since the preliminary draft budget was presented. This is the case in particular for milk and milk products, which is precisely the sector that has not yet undergone reform. Thirdly, and conversely, funds for direct payments in the arable crops sector will be cut in 2003. This follows on from the decisions we took in the summer in connection with the regions in Italy that were hit by severe drought and then the areas affected by the catastrophic flooding in Germany.
In these cases, as you know, we have brought forward advance payments to the 2002 budget year and this is, after all, over EUR 900 million which will, as a result, no longer be needed in the 2003 budget. I would repeat, however, that this can only be a general indication of the content of the letter of amendment; it is too early to anticipate what it will say. For the purpose of the first reading of the draft budget the assumptions on the basis of which it was drawn up will obviously still apply.
Allow me also briefly to address the question, which I am asked so frequently, of the extent to which the proposals made in the context of the mid-term review will impact on the 2003 budget. To be quite plain, not at all, because the mid-term review can only come into force in 2004 and no legislative changes will therefore be made in the coming year which will make it possible to change the budget.
In its motion, the Agriculture Committee calls for funds to be made available to European farmers in compensation for the extreme weather conditions by, for example, using the surplus in the current marketing year or by creating a disaster relief fund in heading 1b. I have already mentioned that we have brought forward significant payments in the arable crops sector. This actually ought to have the effect of substantially reducing the anticipated margin in the current agriculture budget.
As far as a disaster relief fund is concerned, the Commission has already proposed the creation of a solidarity fund, of at least EUR 500 million this year, but of EUR one billion in 2003, and a decision should be taken quickly on this. I would support the point made by the Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development that greater effort should be made to safeguard and improve the quality of agricultural products. However, this is not a matter that can be resolved in the context of the 2003 budget; it requires a longer-term strategy, the very strategy that we have set out in the mid-term review. It ought to be possible to achieve this in particular by changing the form and orientation of the support given to agriculture, for example by applying the principle of cross-compliance and by striking a better balance between the two pillars of the common agricultural policy.
I should also like very briefly, since Mrs Figueiredo addressed this, to mention three issues in connection with fisheries policy. The first is the need to keep the budget for external fisheries policy, which mainly consists of estimated costs of fisheries protocols, at current levels. At its first reading, the Council retained the figures in the preliminary draft budget. This is also absolutely essential if the Community is to be able to continue its fishing activities in third countries. The letter of amendment in the autumn will go into more detail on how the funds are to be split between the budget line and the reserve. In this context, I also welcome the support for our external fisheries policy, and in particular the fisheries agreements, that was voiced by the rapporteurs of the Budgets and Fisheries Committees.
The second issue is the payment of the second instalment to the Spanish and Portuguese fleets that used to fish in Moroccan waters. This is the EUR 27 million. The Commission made an initial proposal in its preliminary draft budget, but so far this has not received the support of the budgetary authority. For the time being, however, the Commission does not see any alternative to using the flexibility instrument either."@en1
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