Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-05-03-Speech-3-157"
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"en.20000503.9.3-157"2
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"Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, first of all, allow me to offer my sincere thanks to the rapporteur, Mrs Schierhuber, for her report and her proposal to adopt the Council decision on the Food Aid Convention. As you know, the International Wheat Agreement comprises two separate legislative texts, the Grains Trade Convention and the Food Aid Convention. The Grains Trade Convention was fundamentally amended as early as 1995, which meant there was no need to envisage amendments to the new convention. And that is why the Commission requested extending the period of validity of that convention until 30 June 2001.
In the case of the Food Aid Convention, however, the Committee on Food Aid decided to renegotiate the agreement and in particular to take on board the recommendations of the Singapore Conference. The purpose of the new 1999 Food Aid Convention is to contribute to creating food security in the world and to enhance the international community’s ability to respond more effectively to acute food crises and the food requirements of the developing countries.
The new convention attaches special importance to the following points. Firstly, more consideration is to be given to local nutritional customs. Secondly, the donor countries can now express their commitments in tonnage, value or a combination of tonnage and value. Thirdly, the members of the convention must give priority to the least developed countries and the lowest income countries when allocating their food aid. Fourthly, stronger provisions are introduced for promoting local agricultural development, including possible triangular transactions and local purchases. More than half the relevant Commission resources will go to such transactions.
My fifth point is that food aid to the least developed countries will be given purely in the form of grants. Overall, food aid provided in the form of grants will represent not less than 80% of a member’s contributions and members will strive to raise this percentage even higher. Next, in determining whether, and to what extent, the food aid provision on long-term concessional credit terms should continue to be covered under the Food Aid Convention, FAC members will take account of the results of the relevant multilateral negotiations. In this connection, the European Union and some other members reaffirmed their opinion that food aid provided under credit terms should no longer be included in the list of food aid operations. Our position is as follows: food aid must be clearly separated from commercial transactions.
My seventh point is that the new Food Aid Convention is intended to improve the monitoring of the effectiveness and impact of food aid transactions and cooperation between food aid donors, recipients and others concerned. Eight, the provision of food aid under this convention will not be tied in any way to commercial exports of goods or services.
In conclusion, since several speakers raised this question during the debate, let me tell you how much aid we are currently providing for Ethiopia. The Commission and the Community are in a position to mobilise 542 526 tonnes of cereals between April 2000 and March 2001, i.e. immediately, this year. Let me also point out that during the negotiations we kept in constant contact with the food aid recipient countries so that we were always aware of their position."@en1
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