Brussels, 28/06/2002 (Agence Europe) - In the context of the traditional procedure called clearance of accounts of the European Agricultural Guidance and Guarantee Fund (EAGGF), now called the "agricultural audit system", the European Commission adopted two decisions. It calls on twelve Member States (all except Germany, Denmark and Austria) to pay back a total of EUR 209.6 million in farm aid considered as misspent. The amounts will be recovered because there were not sufficient guarantees or because Community rules were not respected regarding agricultural expenditure for the different budgetary periods.
The main financial corrections concern: - Greece (EUR 103.5 million for unsatisfactory controls in the arable crop sector); - Italy (EUR 40.1 million, above all for the lack of control in the olive oil and fruit and vegetable sectors and for non-respect of payment times); - and the Netherlands (EUR 20.3 million due to insufficient controls carried out during the swine fever crisis). The sectors that appeared the most vulnerable to fraud and irregularities are arable crops (EUR 114 million), with, far behind, animal premiums (EUR 38.7 million), olive oil (EUR 22.7 million), and fruit and vegetable (EUR 18.2 million).
These are the first decisions of this kind taken this year by the Commission. Two other decisions are expected at the end of the year. We would point out that, in 2001, the amount of aid recovered under account clearance was over EUR 800 million (compared to EUR 624 million in 2000 and EUR 205 million in 1999).