MEPs call for a significant increase in the budget provided for in the Decision on the Association of Overseas Countries and Territories (OCT) from €500 million to €669 million in current prices, in a report adopted by an overwhelming majority (566 votes in favour, 40 against and 41 abstentions) on Thursday 31 January in plenary session by Maurice Ponga (EPP, France).
For the rapporteur, in addition to increasing the overall budget of the new instrument, it was important to rebalance the OCTs, in particular the budget allocation for Greenland to the Dutch and French OCTs.
To this end, MEPs eliminated the €225 million initially earmarked by the European Commission for Greenland and instead drew up a breakdown of budgets between the OCTs expressed as a percentage, as the results of the budgetary negotiations for the post-2020 period are not yet known.
Thus, 4% of the budget is earmarked for Aruba, 1.5% for Bonaire, 5% for Curaçao, 48% for Greenland, 10.75% for New Caledonia, 10.85% for French Polynesia and 1.2% for Saba, 2% for Saint-Barthélemy, 0.8% for Sint Eustatius, 7.5% for Saint-Pierre and Miquelon, 2.5% for Sint-Maarten, 0.4% for the French Southern and Antarctic Territories and finally 5.5% for Wallis and Futuna.
Another source of satisfaction for the rapporteur is the strengthening of the dialogue between the EU and the OCTs to take better account of territorial specificities. MEPs introduced a new paragraph stipulating that the Commission must guarantee access to the OCTs to all EU cooperation programmes and instruments. In practical terms, this means that, for a student from an OCT who wishes to take part in the Erasmus+ programme, the Commission will have to take into account the cost of the flight ticket.
In addition, MEPs call on the European Commission to ensure the greatest possible transparency of information for calls for proposals launched under the various European programmes, in particular through the creation of an online portal dedicated exclusively to the OCTs.
In June 2018, the Commission presented a budget dedicated to neighbourhood and development of €123 billion for the next multiannual financial framework 2021-2027, which included a new DAO (see EUROPE 12041). This new decision takes into account the drastic reduction in the number of OCTs due to the departure of the United Kingdom from the European Union (from 25 to 13) and includes Greenland, which was previously the subject of a separate budget.
It should be noted that this is a decision and that the European Parliament only has an advisory role under Article 207 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU). (Original version in French by Pascal Hansens)