Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2007-09-25-Speech-2-014"
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"en.20070925.4.2-014"2
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"Mr President, let me start by thanking Ms Batzeli and the members of the Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development for all the work they have carried out on this proposal. I will now start to place the proposal into its context.
In order to make it easier to reach a market balance during the restructuring period, it is proposed to make the preventive withdrawal a permanent tool, not only during the restructuring period, exactly as is proposed by Ms Batzeli in her report.
The proposed draft regulations aim to create a secure environment and to remove existing blockages from the system. All these improvements should make the fund a success in the third year, without changing the common market organisation for sugar on the basis of the reform that we agreed in 2005. The measures proposed are balanced to create strong incentives for all parties that are involved in the restructuring process.
I want to thank you for your good cooperation, which makes it possible for us to adhere to the tight schedule that we have to work under and to have this much more efficient system in place for the marketing year 2008/09. I am aware that the fund must be improved to achieve its aim and, if this is not possible, I am quite sure that there will be no winners. There will only be losers and, therefore, I have been very grateful for the support that I have met from the Agriculture Committee and the Members.
As you know, the restructuring fund did not fulfil our expectations during the second year of the restructuring period, after actually quite a promising first year.
As you might remember, we were expecting about 1.5 million tonnes of quota to be renounced in the first year and more than 3 million tonnes in the second year. In reality, the total renunciation in the first two years amounted to only 2.2 million tonnes against an expected 4.5 million tonnes.
I am still convinced that the restructuring fund is a good instrument as such, which should be strengthened and improved, taking into account the experiences that we have had up to now.
Concerning the proposal we are to discuss today, let me make it clear that we are not in a process of renegotiating the sugar reform from 2005. In light of the insufficient take-up under the restructuring fund over the first two years of its operation, the objective is to make a success out of it for the last two years. Otherwise the final uncompensated cut of the quotas will kick in in 2010.
This proposal aims to make a very attractive offer to those undertakings and to those growers that want to give up quota production in the marketing year 2008/09, while in principle keeping unchanged the conditions for the last year of the restructuring period. For the first time, growers will be able to trigger the restructuring process, but only up to a limit of 10% of the quota belonging to an undertaking. The percentage of the restructuring aid reserved for growers will be fixed at 10% and this payment will be then supplemented by a top-up of EUR 237.5 per tonne of sugar quota and this sums up altogether to EUR 300 per tonne.
I think this is a very interesting offer for the growers and I do not see any need to go further. That is why I will not be in a position to support the amendments in the report on the restructuring fund that asks for changes in the amounts paid, for example 6, 7 and 12, or in the percentage that goes to the farmers: namely, amendment 8.
An element of retroactivity will ensure that those undertakings and those sugar beet producers who have already taken part in the restructuring scheme up till now have not been or will not be disadvantaged by having done so.
As requested in amendment 9, the eligibility of inulin syrup producers and chicory growers for retroactive payments will be explicitly mentioned in the final text. Moreover, undertakings that will be restructured in the marketing or growing year 2008/09 could be exempted from the restructuring levy applied to the quantity subject to the 2007/08 preventive withdrawal, provided that they renounce their quota accordingly. And, last but not least, as an additional incentive for undertakings, their individual restructuring effort will be taken into account in case of an obligatory final quota cut."@en1
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