Brussels, 26/01/2000 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission has adopted a communication on the financial management of the new agricultural pre-accession instrument SAPARD, which was set in place in the context of the Agenda 2000 and which will finance agricultural projects in applicant countries of Central and Eastern Europe.
It will propose the introduction of a decentralised management method from start to finish of the procedure, from project selection to payments. Each applicant country would create a SAPARD agency to which management and payment tasks would be allocated after on-site verification of the agency's capacity and the validity of national authorisation given regarding Community financial management criteria. In order to guarantee correct use of Community funds (some EUR 520 million annually) for the financing of targeted rural development measures, the Commission also provides for the application of an account clearance procedure, which will allow financial corrections to be carried out in the event of non-compliance with SAPARD rules, for example, in the event of insufficient controls at national level. These new rules must be the subject of an implementation regulation that will be formally adopted by the Commission in coming weeks.
EUROPE recalls that the allocation of the SAPARD instrument has already been the subject of an indicative breakdown between the ten beneficiary CEECs (from EUR 6.3 million annually to Slovenia to EUR 168.6 million for Poland, 150 million for Romania, etc.).