Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2002-06-12-Speech-3-201"
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"en.20020612.5.3-201"2
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"Madam President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, in my opinion there is still a great need for information about eastward enlargement in the EU Member States. At least, that is what I find when meeting citizens at events in my constituency.
Today I would like to speak in particular about the challenge of agriculture and eastward enlargement. I would like to congratulate Mr Olsson on his very good report on EU enlargement and agriculture. How can the new Member States be successfully integrated into the common agricultural policy? That is a key question for most of the candidate countries and it is crucial because in the countries of central and eastern Europe agriculture accounts for a larger proportion of national income than the EU average. The same is true of employment in the economy as a whole. The accession of ten countries in 2004 will increase the agricultural area by 29% and the number of agricultural holdings by 74%. But the number of consumers will increase by 24%.
How can we best shape accession and integration in the long term? In my opinion, the countries of central and eastern Europe will and must press ahead with changing the structure of their agriculture. The European agricultural model where farmers have the twin tasks of producing in some places and caring for the countryside in others must be applied in those countries too. In my view, the high standards of hygiene in production and processing must apply from the first day of accession, otherwise European consumer policy will become a farce. Environmental concerns and alternative jobs in rural areas must be funded from the second pillar of the common agricultural policy. We agree that the Commission is taking the right approach there in aligning financial compensation payments gradually. If we allowed too much money in at the start, agricultural structures there would be ossified, and that cannot be the right way for those concerned either.
While I believe our citizens do not know enough about eastern Europe, I also noted during the hearing that farmers in the candidate countries, too, still have a lot of public relations work to do at home."@en1
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