Brussels, 15/10/2015 (Agence Europe) - At its meeting on Monday 12 October, the Special Committee on Agriculture (SCA) finally gave the Luxembourg Presidency of the Council a mandate to open talks with representatives of the European Parliament on the draft regulation on the schemes to distribute milk and fruit and vegetables in schools.
The mandate, however, relates only to the amendment of the single CMO regulation (Regulation 1308/2013 on common market organisation).
Amendment of Regulation 1370/2013 on fixing certain aids (exclusively within the power of the Council) will, in theory, not feature in the negotiations.
With a view to trialogue discussions with Parliament, the Council mandate includes a number of principles underpinning the Council's position on the revision of the school milk and fruit and vegetables schemes (according to an annex drafted by the Luxembourg Presidency of the Council): - the merging of the current two separate schemes and the new common legal framework will streamline the two schemes and will result in a greater effectiveness of the Union aid programme; - the educational dimension of the scheme will be strengthened, notably by making the accompanying educational measures a requirement also for the milk part of the scheme; the accompanying educational measures also play a role in the distribution of products, as a wider variety of agricultural products can be distributed to children by this means; - striking the right balance between, on one hand, the regulatory dimension of the programme and, on the other hand, the flexibility left to member states in its implementation, limiting at the same time the administrative burden as much as possible; - concerning the list of eligible products, different categories of products should be considered: fresh fruit and vegetables and drinking milk (including lactose-free milk) are the core products of the scheme; in addition, member states can decide to distribute processed products, provided they are healthy; - that the products distributed under the scheme are healthy is ensured by the involvement of national authorities competent in the field of health and nutrition, at a degree depending on the type of products: they have to be consulted on the distribution of fresh and processed products but have to endorse the distribution of processed fruit and vegetable products containing added sugar, fat, salt and sweeteners; - member states remain free to choose, in their strategies, the products to be featured in the distribution or to be included in the educational measures; the availability of local and regional products, as well as the priority to be given, as much as possible, to local and regional purchasing and to organic products “are elements guiding member states' choice in the new scheme, in addition to the criteria already mentioned in the current legislation”, the Luxembourg Presidency states; -, flexibility will be granted to member states which will be able to choose the products to be distributed and transfer financial allocations from one group of products. Lastly the text does not stipulate a hierarchy among the eligible products.
The Luxembourg Presidency's draft text on the proposal revising the schemes for the distribution of fruit and vegetable and milk in schools was well received by the SCA on Monday 21 September (see EUROPE 11396). In January 2014, the Commission adopted two proposals merging these schemes. In November 2014, the Council wrote to the Commission asking it to amend the legal basis of its proposals arguing that arrangements for setting the level of aid should be based on Article 43.3 TFEU (Council competence). While awaiting the Commission's response, technical examination of the proposals by the Council was suspended. Parliament did not follow the Commission recommendation and adopted its position at first reading on 27 May 2015 (see EUROPE 11323). (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)