Strasbourg, 11/12/2007 (Agence Europe) - On Tuesday 11 December, the European Parliament softened and simplified to as great an extent as possible the cross compliance system making the payment of EU farm aid contingent upon respect of environmental, food safety and animal welfare standards. Adopting by an overwhelming majority (635 to 21 with 13 abstentions) a report by Jan Mulder (ALDE, the Netherlands), the European Parliament introduced changes to the initial proposal to make the cross compliance rules more popular with farmers.
The European Parliament agriculture committee's position has been confirmed by the EP (see details in EUROPE 9553), apart from tolerance for minor infringements. The Commission is suggesting that member states can decide, in the event of non-compliance, whether or not to reduce aid by up to €50 per farmer and per calendar year. According to the amendment endorsed by the EP in plenary, this cap should be set at €100 to cut red tape to a sufficient extent, as opposed to €250 according to the agriculture committee. Bernadette Bourzai (PES, France) said that she had negotiated the €100 cap with the ALDE and Greens/EFA groups and described it as a good compromise to reduce red tape for member states' implementing authorities while maintaining sufficient pressure to make farmers respect cross compliance rules. She said she totally opposed the idea of increasing the cap to €250. Bourzai, who is vice-president of the agriculture committee, said that the €250 cap would mean that penalties against most infringements resulting in lower aid would not be applied and the cross-compliance system for aid would be meaningless.
The EP is also calling for the option of prior notification of controls to farmers except where such information might lead to a manipulation of results. Measures have been foreseen to get member states to improve their planning of controls during the year in line with seasonal constraints on farmers. (L.C.)