(2004/C 70 E/228)

WRITTEN QUESTION E-3079/03

by Torben Lund (PSE) to the Commission

(20 October 2003)

Subject:   Regulation (EC) No 1221/97 and aid for beekeeping

Regulation (EC) No 1221/97 (1) includes rules for improving the production and marketing of honey. Nevertheless, beekeeping is under pressure in several places in Europe and numbers have dropped sharply in several areas. For this among other reasons, a number of Member States are attempting to improve the situation for beekeepers by subsidising research, etc. In Denmark, however, the government has quite paradoxically proposed eliminating aid for beekeeping despite the grave situation in this sector.

This being so, will the Commission provide an update on how all the different Member States aid their national beekeeping industry and, at the same time, give an assessment as to how Denmark's draft finance bill for 2004 can be reconciled with Regulation (EC) No 1221/97 and other relevant EU legislation? Lastly, will it indicate how the EU promotes the situation of beekeepers through various schemes and explain forthcoming EU proposals to improve both the situation of beekeepers and honey production in the EU?

Answer given by Mr Fischler on behalf of the Commission

(25 November 2003)

As the Honourable Member indicates, the purpose of Council Regulation (EC) No 1221/97 of 25 June 1997 laying down general rules for the application of measures to improve the production and marketing of honey (2) is to support beekeeping in the Union.

Its Article 1(1) states that Member States ‘may lay down national programmes for each year’. Thus it is up to the Member State to decide whether or not to have a programme. If it does so, the programme must embrace one or more of the priority measures listed in Article 1. In addition Article 4 states that the national programmes are to be drawn up in close collaboration with the representative organisations and beekeeping cooperatives.

The Commission sent a report (3) to the Council and Parliament on implementation of the Regulation. It covers the first three years of the programmes and can be consulted on the Agriculture Directorate-General's website (4).

Support for beekeeping is also possible under Council Regulation (EC) No 1257/1999 of 17 May 1999 on support for rural development from the European Agricultural Guidance and Guarantee Fund (5). Investment aid can for example be given to farmers diversifying into beekeeping and to beekeepers improving the processing and marketing of their honey. Among the new measures introduced under common agricultural policy reform (6) the ‘Food Quality’ chapter offers, subject to certain requirements, new possibilities for honey production. All rural development support must however fall within the scope of a rural development plan. These are drawn up and managed, following approval by the Commission, by the Member States and/or their regions.

(1)  OJ L 173, 1.7.1997, p. 1.

(2)  Amended by Council Regulation (EC) No 2070/98 of 28 September 1998, OJ L 265, 30.9.1998.

(3)  COM(2001) 70 final.

(4)  http://europa.eu.int/comm/agriculture/markets/honey/index_en.htm

(5)  OJ L 160, 26.6.1999.

(6)  Council Regulation (EC) No 1783/2003 amending Regulation (EC) No 1257/1999, OJ L 270, 21.10.2003.