91997E4195

WRITTEN QUESTION E-4195/97 by José García-Margallo y Marfil (PPE) to the Commission (21 January 1998)

Subject: Agenda 2000 and Objective 1: state aid 1993-1997

At the end of November the Director-General of Regional Policy and Cohesion, Eneko Landäburu, suggested, in the presence of press representatives, that 11 European regions, including Valencia (Spain), were to lose their Objective 1 status under the terms of the Commission proposals to reduce the Structural Funds before the accession of new Member States.

Mr Landäburu's calculations were based on the provisional data currently available to the Commission. However, in the specific case of Valencia, official Eurostat statistics show that, in 1993, the Valencia Autonomous Community's GDP was 74.9% of the European average and that, in 1994, the figure was even lower (73.6%). The threshold for Objective 1 eligibility is 75%, hence there are no grounds for supposing that Valencia is going to fail the eligibility test in the near future.

Should the average income of the various regions during the 1993-1997 period be taken as the criterion for calculating GDP, it is important that the macro-economic data for each region should be known for all of the years concerned.

How much state aid was granted in 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996 and 1997 to the 15 Member States and the following regions:

- Anatolia, Macedonia, Thessaly, Crete, Pelopennese, Central Greece, Ipiros, Attica, Ionian Islands, Aegean, Sterea (Greece)

- Hainaut (Belgium)

- Thuringia, Brandenburg, East Berlin, Saxony-Anhalt, Saxony, Munster (Germany)

- Galicia, Extremadura, Castilla la Mancha, Castilla y Leon, Ceuta and Melilla, Valencia Autonomous Community, Asturias, Andalusia, Canary Islands, Murcia (Spain)

- Valenciennes, Avesnes, Douai, Overseas Departments (France)

- Ulster, Connaught, Leinster (Ireland)

- Molise, Apulia, Sicily, Basilicata, Sardinia, Calabria, Campania (Italy)

- Flevoland (Netherlands)

- Burgerland (Austria)

- Northern Region, Alentejo, Algarve, Lisbon, Tagus Valley, Central Region (Portugal)

- Western Isles, Highlands, Merseyside, Northern Ireland (United Kingdom)?

Answer given by Mr Van Miert on behalf of the Commission (18 February 1998)

The Honourable Member will find below the available aggregate figures for state aid granted under national regional aid schemes (Article 92(3)(a) of the EC Treaty):

Annual average for the period 1992-94 (in MECU)

>TABLE>

The figures for subsequent years are not yet available. The Commission would inform the Honourable Member that it is not provided with a regional breakdown of aid granted under horizontal schemes such as those for research and development (R& D) and for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).