Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2010-11-23-Speech-2-596"
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"en.20101123.42.2-596"2
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"Madam President, ladies and gentlemen, allow me firstly to provide answers to your written question regarding the simplification of the common agricultural policy, an important subject, as I have repeatedly said since I became Commissioner, and which we will take into consideration for future legislation.
As for the second pillar, the Commission has launched a study on the administrative burden that stems from implementing rural development programmes for beneficiaries. The study concentrated on two categories of measures: agro-environmental and farm modernisation. The results of this study will be used in our reflection on the CAP for the period after 2013.
To end on this first point, I would also like to inform you that the programme is ongoing, and that it includes time spent on a farm for staff of the Directorate General for Agriculture and Rural Development. This programme, also called ‘Harvest experience’, helps us to have direct contact with what is really happening on the ground and to use that experience in the decisions we prepare.
Now to the second part of your question: how will the Commission take into account Parliament’s suggestions in its work on the post-2013 CAP? Here, too, I can assure you that these questions are of concern to me and that we are going to take into account all the analyses that we have already conducted with a view to simplification, but also the proposals that we will be making, which do not move in the direction of more red tape but rather in the direction of more assurance for the taxpayer that the money is well used.
On this point too, I am open to any technical proposal that you wish to make. In early December, I will go before your fellow Members from the Committee on Budgetary Control, which is also asking what the Commission is doing to ensure that public money is well spent. The Commission, in this case, can only apply regulations that have been adopted by the Council, often after considering Parliament’s opinion.
It is not the Commission that is adding administrative tasks. The Commission only applies existing Council regulations. On that, I can assure you that in future, we will not be making proposals that complicate things unnecessarily; on the contrary, we will be making proposals that make the CAP more credible in content. As for farmers, their main role is, as I have already said, agricultural production; they are the ones who work with these natural resources and it is also because of this activity that a portion of CAP funding is allocated to that policy.
With regard to what we plan to do after 2013, I would like to inform you that in parallel to preparing the legislative package for the CAP after 2013, I decided to create a high-level technical group with the Commission and Member States in order to ensure that this legislative package will not produce more red tape, but instead will simplify things wherever possible.
As Mr Lyon said, often the red tape encountered by the farmer on the ground does not only come from the Commission. You know that management is shared with Member States and we often have applications that are different from one Member State to the other, precisely because of the national administrations. As far as these are concerned, it is not up to the Commission to simplify. As I have already said, the Commission has already simplified things. There is still the need to simplify at Member State level.
To answer Mr Lyon’s question regarding Scotland, here too, the Commission is only complying with the regulations that stipulate that for those farmers who do not adhere to the cross-compliance standards, penalties should apply not only in Scotland, but also in Northern Ireland and elsewhere in Europe. Once again, this is a rule that, if we do not comply with it, discredits us in respect of the commitments that farmers make to adhere to European legislation, since cross-compliance is not a standard added by the Commission, by a Member State or by any other body, but stems from European legislation which is reflected in these regulations. Governments will receive more details by early December, when the Commission is to present the findings of its audits.
I would like to start with the first part of your question: what has the Commission done until now to make things easier for farmers? I think that if we look at what has been done these last few years, the answer is clear: it has already done a lot to make things easier, and it has already put in place many measures to make things easier for farmers.
In March 2009, the Commission presented the communication ‘A simplified CAP for Europe – a success for all’. This communication highlights the activities that have taken place over the last few years and provides information on the reduced administrative burden obtained.
I do not wish to repeat every element from this communication, but I would like to expand on a few examples.
First of all, the adoption in 2007 of the Council regulation establishing a common organisation of agricultural markets has led to a substantial reduction in red tape in the application framework of the European legislation on the CAP.
Because of its technical features, this single common market organisation did not intend to change the underlying policy but to harmonise the provisions, thus making CAP rules simpler to manage, lighter, more accessible and less difficult to apply.
Simplification was also one of the main reasons that motivated the Commission’s ‘health check’ proposals. The regulation adopted in 2009 simplifies the provisions of the single payment system, thereby improving the effectiveness of the 2003 CAP reform.
Furthermore, to illustrate the progress accomplished in the farming sector, I would also like to mention the action programme to reduce the administrative burden in the European Union. In the context of this programme, several assessments have been conducted. The outcome of these assessments shows that the administrative burden in the farming sector has been cut by 36%, which is much more than the programme’s general target of 25%.
Last year, my predecessor presented the first response from the Commission services to the list of 39 simplification suggestions that had been proposed by 13 Member States in April 2009. Some of the 39 suggestions were implemented at the end of 2009 and the beginning of 2010. Others can be found in the ‘simplification’ package that has just been adopted by the Commission with reference to direct payments and rural development, and regulations were presented to the Council and to Parliament."@en1
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