Brussels, 08/10/2004 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission has adopted a decision on the restructuring and conversion of vineyards, making an indicative financial distribution of EUR 450 million for actions in the 2004/2005 marketing year for fourteen of the twenty-five Member States (Spain, France, Italy, Greece, Portugal, Germany, Luxembourg, Austria, the Czech Republic, Cyprus, Hungary, Malta, Slovenia and Slovakia).
During the previous four marketing years, the EU budget for converting vineyards stood at EUR 380 million, EUR 422 million, EUR 443 million and EUR 443 million. Of the total EU budget of EUR 450 million for 2004-2005m The Commission has earmarked EUR 145 million for Spain, EUR 107 million for France, EUR 103 million for Italy, EUR 44.5 million for Portugal, EUR 12.6 million for Germany, EUR 10 million for Hungary, and EUR 9.7 million for Greece, 61688 hectares (ha) of vineyards are covered by these programmes, namely 19379 ha in Spain, 14529 ha in Italy, 13541 ha in France, 6987 ha in Portugal, 1971 ha in Germany and 1360 ha in Greece.
The Commission also adopted another decision setting the definitive allocations for the 2003/2004 marketing years in terms of the number of hectares and amount of aid. EUR 443 million euros is earmarked for eight of the pre-enlargement Member States, covering a total of 71948 hectares of vineyards.