Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2001-05-16-Speech-3-338"
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"en.20010516.11.3-338"2
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"Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, my congratulations to Mr Casaca on his excellent report, which amply demonstrates that we have still not managed to bring olive oil regulations into line with the demands of modern agriculture and the fact that this agricultural policy is in need of radical reform.
I should like to cite two examples here. First: one of the main objectives of production aid is to give olive farmers a fair income and guarantee market balance. As the Court of Auditors quite rightly states, the objective of production aid in relation to producers' income has never been defined. In other words, no one knows if this objective has ever been achieved, because we have never been able to assess it. The same applies to market balance. In 1998, the Commission established that there are 180 million olive trees. That came as something of a surprise, because Olistat had reckoned with a lot fewer trees, some 140 million. That is a difference of 40 million trees, a discrepancy of about 31%. Just consider, you think you have market balance and then you find out that you have 30% too much stock. The increase in stock over the last two years does, in fact, indicate that there is a surplus.
Secondly, there were similar weaknesses in the consumption aid abolished at the end of 1998. There was no obligation to keep records or ledgers of accounts payable. As a result, there was a huge amount of fraud and irregularity. EUR 429 million in undue amounts have still not been recovered for the 1985-1998 period. Only 6% has been recovered so far. Just think how financial control and recovery were reorganised in connection with the reform of the Commission. We really do have our work cut out here.
As far as export refunds are concerned, just 13% of the money has been recovered. Anyone who takes the protection of European taxpayers seriously just wants to get on and reform this agricultural policy. Mr Casaca's report shows us how."@en1
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