Brussels, 02/12/2010 (Agence Europe) - On Wednesday 1 December, members of the European Parliament's budgetary control committee stated that progress had been made in the area of agricultural spending management and control. This analysis is in line with the recommendations this parliamentary committee is expected to make at the beginning of April 2011 (in view of the vote at the European Parliament on 8 April 2011) on granting the European Commission a discharge on the budget for 2009.
Michel Cretin, a member of the European Court of Auditors, pointed out that the amount for the 2009 budget in section II (management of natural resources) now stood at €57 billion (payment appropriations), “almost half the EU budget”. In its annual report for 2009 (adopted at the beginning of November), the Court concluded that these payments are “affected by a significant rate of error, between 2 and 5% of the total amount”.
In the view of Dacian Cioloº, the commissioner for agriculture, these “positive” results demonstrate that “the common agricultural policy is well managed”. He added that they had to make further efforts “to reduce the rate of error as much as possible”. The role of the authorities in member states is crucial in a policy where management is shared. Cioloº said that he was following the execution of the budget very closely in member states and that when it proved necessary, “we will ensure they develop action plans” to improve the management and control systems and “when it is needed, the Commission is prepared to suspend payments. We have done it in the past and I will not hesitate in proposing it again”.
The commissioner intends to tackle the following issues: 1) The Integrated Administration and Control System (IACS). He conceded that that this system is “efficient and reliable, even if significant weaknesses have been revealed in Bulgaria and Romania and in the past in Greece. There are also more limited deficiencies that have been identified in other member states”. Cioloº is committed to improving the quality of data in the Parcel Identification System (countries must correct possible weaknesses and an exchange of the different experiences is planned); 2) Recovery. “I can present you with a higher recovery rate than in the past, which is much better than the modest 10% indicated in the report by the Court”, explained the commissioner. With regard to the irregularities identified in 2007, EU countries at the end of 2009 had already recovered 49% of misused funds; 3) Assurances by member states. The commissioner emphasised: “I want this to be even more solid in the future. I am proposing that the role of the certification bodies is strengthened”. For confirming the rate of error, the different bodies will have to provide another representative sample of the transactions that have already been inspected by bodies responsible for payment. This is being discussed within the context of CAP reform. The commissioner also appealed for simpler controls. The European Court of Auditors has criticised the fact that agricultural funds had sometimes been paid to non-farmers. The Commission proposed in its communication on reform that payments be better targeted towards working farmers.
Jorgo Chatzimarkakis (ALDE), the EP rapporteur on the 2009 budget discharge exclaimed that they had to recognise that progress had been made when looking at “how the monitoring systems are working in the agricultural sector, after the pressure exerted by the European Parliament to improve the situation, especially the IACS”. He added that “we can see the difference compared to other spending areas, such as cohesion policy. Surveillance is working better, as well as recovery methods”. Nonetheless, he did criticise the significant problems persisting in Romania and Bulgaria and said that they had not really completed implementation of the IACS in Greece. He also had a number of concerns about the future. CAP surveillance will be more difficult because it will focus less on direct aid and market spending and more on rural development programmes. Finally, the rapporteur called on Cioloº to present an action plan on payment suspensions.
Following the declarations of the rapporteur, Cioloº asked whether IACS in 2009 would cover more than 80% of the CAP. He also said that it would cover a significant part of rural development (agri-environmental measures). On the question of Greece, reservations had been tackled because the procedure is quite clear on what has to be done before unblocking funds when a problem has been detected in the area of IACS. Nevertheless, “if we observe that controls on the ground are still encountering problems, accounts will be cleared”. Finally, he welcomed the idea of the rapporteur to hold (as in the example of cohesion policy spending), tripartite meetings “Commission, Court of Auditors and the national authority). He also said that it would be useful in certain inspections on the ground for the member states to be present in order to “explain how the controls have been carried out”. (L.C./transl.fl)