Brussels, 02/08/2001 (Agence Europe) - In its ninth report on State aid in the EU, the Commission welcomes progress made in the matter, while urging Member states to make more efforts to further reduce the level of aid, which remains high. This ninth report updates the data of the previous report providing data relating to the period 1997-1999. According to these statistics, the overall level of aid was reduced, for that period, to an annual average of 90 billion euro, against 102 billion for the previous period (1995-1997), and this thanks to a reduction in aid to the manufacturing, transport and agricultural sectors. Aid to the coal industry also recorded a slight fall, whereas aid to the services sector, on the other hand, increased.
Here are the main characteristics of the report: a) Aid to the manufacturing sector fell from 36 to 28 billion euro. This drop is essentially attributable to Italy and Germany, countries in which the amount of aid decreased sharply. In Belgium, Greece, Spain, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom, the level of aid to this sector also decreased but this decrease was compensated by the increase recorded in the other Member States; b) there is still great disparity between Member States. The level of aid as a percentage of value added was highest in Greece, where it is seven times superior to that recorded in the United Kingdom, country where, along with Portugal, it is the lowest. Member States such as Sweden, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and Portugal retained their low level of aid, whereas Italy, Germany and Spain rapidly reduced that level; c) the amount of "ad hoc" aid was considerably reduced. This type of aid, granted to certain companies in difficulty outside horizontal, regional or sectorial aid schemes, is submitted to increasingly stricter controls because of the distortions to competition it provokes.
Commissioner Monti, responsible for competition declared concerning this ninth report: "Member States should continue to make all efforts to carefully rethink their aid spending. Every single reduction of aid clearly reduces the distortion of competition in the Internal Market and increases the benefits of Economic and Monetary Union. On the Commission's side, I will maintain strict state aid control as a priority".