Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2002-04-25-Speech-4-053"
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"en.20020425.3.4-053"2
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"Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, I would, first, like to express my heartfelt thanks for the constructive contributions that have been made to today's debate, one to which I attach the highest importance, and in which, essentially, two specific issues have been raised, with which I would like to deal briefly. The first, agriculture, is one that touches on my direct powers. The observation was made that, in many developing countries, the European Union is killing the farmers. That sort of comment really cannot be left unchallenged, and I would like to enlighten you a bit about how our import and export situation looks at the moment.
I would like to point out to you that the European Union at present imports more agricultural produce from developing countries than do the USA, Australia, Canada, New Zealand and Japan put together. The other developed states have nothing to reproach us for.
The second point I would like to make to you is that we are a net importer from the developing countries, which means that we import more agricultural produce from these states than we export to them – an immense contrast to the states I just mentioned, which are all great net exporters. Let me also, finally, point out to you that, in all the major sectors, the European Union's share of agricultural produce exports has declined in the course of the last five years.
I would like to conclude by reminding you that we should at last stop blaming ourselves for things that no longer exist. If you really must still talk about the massive surplus mountains in the European Union, then I invite you to show me them sometime. We no longer have surplus mountains. What we have is balanced production.
The second important issue that was raised had to do with how we intend to ensure that the Member States actually keep to the commitments they make in Council. On this point I have to draw your attention to the fact that what the Member States have committed themselves to is a general declaration by the Council, no more and no less. No legal instrument is available to us to actually demand these amounts at law; instead, the only thing we can do when individual Member States fail to honour this obligation is together – the Commission and you in Parliament – to remind those Member States of how important it is that they should do so."@en1
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