Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-04-13-Speech-4-027"
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"en.20000413.2.4-027"2
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"Mr President, Commissioner, it falls to me to summarise the problems of the COM in bananas in just a few minutes. That is a considerable challenge and one which makes no sense unless we understand what is really at stake in this issue. It has been a source of conflict for at least a decade, both at the trading level – between the operators – and at the institutional and international level. The reason for that is simple. The banana is now one of the great basic human foodstuffs and control of the trade clearly has a geostrategic dimension.
This is a tropical fruit marketed in the Northern hemisphere and its distribution is also a fundamental part of North-South cooperation. The real question we face is whether or not the European Union can succeed in organising, within its own market, a juxtaposition of flows from the producer regions of Europe, the ACP countries and Latin America. Today we are debating a proposal from the European Commission which, by providing for an automatic swing towards tariffs, will lead to the ineluctable disappearance of production in European regions, which currently represents 25% of our market supply.
Such a development would be contrary to the actual purpose of regional policy and the common agricultural policy – the two pillars of the European Union – and we do not want that under any circumstances. So we must resolutely set the prospect to one side by adopting the Dary report. I congratulate and thank Mr Dary. For those fundamental reasons, and to protect the interests of consumers on the European market by maintaining a juxtaposition of flows from the Union, the ACP countries and third countries, in the context of genuine and sustained competition based on an adequate number of operators, we ask you to accept all the proposed amendments.
Failure on this sensitive banana issue would be an admission of weakness on the part of the European Union and would represent a very strong and rousing signal, exploited by all opponents of the common agricultural policy to oppose the social, family and multi-functional agricultural model. It is our duty to preserve everything the Union stands for, especially on the eve of its enlargement."@en1
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