Strasbourg, 13/03/2003 (Agence Europe) - In Tuesday's adoption of the report by Xavier Mayer (CSU), the European Parliament approved the proposal to increase Community agricultural and rural development aid (Sapard programme) to those candidate countries that were affected by exceptional natural disasters. This proposed change to the rules of the Sapard programme is part of an envelope of measures presented by the Commission last year to tackle the aftermath of floods that hit Europe in August 2002. The Czech Republic and, to a lesser extent, Slovakia, were the worst hit of the candidate countries.
The Commission hopes to raise the ceiling of total eligible public expenditure from 50% to 75% for projects directly linked to the disasters, and to increase the Community contribution from 75% to 85%. The proposed changes are applicable retroactively to 1 July 2002. The Czech authorities have estimated the damage caused by the floods at 2.34 billion euro, 3.1% of the country's GDP in 2002, of which 114 million euro in the agricultural sector. The facilitated access to the 23.5m euro of credits allocated to the Czech Republic in the framework of the Sapard programme in 2002 will go some way to relieving the farmers affected.