Brussels, 14/06/2011 (Agence Europe) - France is currently recovering some of the state aid paid out to French fruit and vegetable producers between 1992 and 2002 that has been deemed illegal and the European Commission confirmed on Tuesday 14 June that the bill will be lighter.
The affair is an old one. At the start of the 1990s, fruit and vegetable producers in France were experiencing financial difficulties. To help them, the French state granted them exceptional aid for the storage, destruction, processing and export of produce. This was intended to be a temporary measure, but it continued until 2002. Following a long investigation, the Commission decided in 2009 to call for the aid to be recovered.
The total to be recovered from French producers amounted initially to €338 million, without counting the interest - hence the oft-quoted figure of €600 million. The Commission has been in regular contact with France, which has been providing updates on the progress of the recovery procedure. France is currently consulting recipients to check the amounts involved and has begun sending the first recovery order to confirmed beneficiaries. The Commission has indicated that, to keep the bill down, it is in France's interest to demand reimbursement as quickly as possible.
Reduction of reimbursement. The Commission has accepted that the aid paid out between 1992 and 1997 (aid granted between 1992 and 2002 was to be recovered) should not be recouped. This was in the light of information provided by France demonstrating that it would be impossible to recover this aid. For the remaining period (1998-2002), France can examine each case individually so that, in the event of farmers having received very low sums, this aid might be covered by the rules on de minimis aid (aid below €7,500 per recipient over three years, of which the Commission need not be notified) and so will not have to be recovered.
With French (and other countries') agriculture in dire straits (drought, E.coli, etc), will reimbursement be deferred? The Commission decision requires that aid paid out must be recovered and seeks to “restore the competition which was distorted by the granting of illegal aid”, the Commission says. (L.C./transl.rt)