52013DC0657

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1........... BUDGET PROCEDURE. 3

2........... CASH POSITION AND MANAGEMENT OF APPROPRIATIONS. 6

3........... THE IMPLEMENTATION OF THE 2012 EAGF BUDGET. 8

4........... COMMENTS ON THE IMPLEMENTATION OF THE 2012 EAGF BUDGET. 9

5........... IMPLEMENTATION OF ASSIGNED REVENUE. 11

6........... BREAKDOWN BY TYPE OF EXPENDITURE. 12

Annex 1 Annex 2 Annex 3 Annex 4-I Annex 4-II Annex 5 Annex 6 || Budgetary procedure for 2012 EAGF Commitment Appropriations Part of the EAGF budget in the EU budget 2006 to 2012 Analysis of EAGF budgetary execution – 2012 Financial year Analysis of EAGF Budgetary execution – 2012 Financial year. assigned revenue. C4 Analysis of EAGF Budgetary execution – 2012 Financial year. assigned revenue. C5 EAGF Budgetary execution by article and by Member State – 2012 Financial year Evolution of the breakdown of EAGF expenditure 2007 to 2012 Financial years

Note: A detailed Commission Working Document accompanies this report. The full text of this Working Document (in English) and the annexed tables (in English) will be also available on DG Agriculture’s Europa website ( http://ec.europa.eu/agriculture/cap-funding/financial-reports/eagf/index_en.htm).

1.           BUDGET PROCEDURE[1]

1.1.        Draft Budget 2012

The 2012 Draft Budget (DB) was adopted by the Commission and proposed to the Budgetary Authority on 20.04.2011. The commitment appropriations proposed for the European Agricultural Guarantee Fund (EAGF) under heading 2 of the Financial Framework 2007-2013 totalled EUR 44 179.7 million.

The Council adopted its position on the 2012 Draft Budget on 25.07.2011 whereby it reduced commitment appropriations for EAGF by EUR 535.5 million, when compared to the Commission's DB, to EUR 43 644.2 million. On the other hand, the European Parliament adopted its position on the 2012 Draft Budget on 26.10.2011 whereby it increased commitment appropriations for EAGF by EUR 271.9 million, when compared to the Commission's DB, to EUR 44 451.6 million.

1.2.        Amending Letter for 2012

On 25.10.2011 the Commission adopted Amending Letter (AL) No 3 to the 2012 DB, setting commitment appropriation requirements for EAGF at EUR                     44 091.6 million. This amount was lower by EUR 88.1 million compared to the one foreseen for the Draft Budget. This decrease was mostly attributable to the increase of the expected available assigned revenue in 2012 by EUR 291 million. Specifically, the assigned revenue foreseen in the DB 2012 amounted to EUR 791 million. This amount was increased to EUR 1 010 million in the Amending Letter for 2012.

1.3.        Adoption of the 2012 budget

Agreement was reached on the 2012 EAGF budget in the conciliation procedure in November 2011. This budget was adopted by the European Parliament on 1 December 2011. The budget included commitment and payment appropriations as follows:

– Commitment appropriations of EUR 43 603.4 million and payment appropriations of EUR 43 601.3 million for agricultural market measures and direct aids (policy area 05 - Agriculture and Rural Development).

– Commitment appropriations of EUR 335.8 million and payment appropriations of EUR 245.5 million for veterinary and phyto-sanitary measures (policy area 17 -Health and Consumer Protection).

– Commitment appropriations of EUR 30.5 million and payment appropriations of EUR 29.1 million for fisheries markets (policy area 11-Maritime Affairs and Fisheries).

The budget’s total commitment appropriations for EAGF amounted to EUR 43 969.6 million and its payment appropriations amounted to EUR 43 876 million. The difference between commitment and payment appropriations is due to the fact, that for certain measures, which are directly implemented by the Commission, differentiated appropriations are used. These measures relate mainly to the promotion of agricultural products, to policy strategy and coordination measures for agriculture as well as to fisheries and to veterinary and phyto-sanitary measures.

Specifically, of the voted EAGF commitment appropriations for policy area 05 amounting to EUR 43 603.4 million, EUR 3 230.8 million were foreseen for market measures under chapter 05 02, EUR 40 510.7 million were foreseen for direct aids under chapter 05 03, - EUR 192,7 million were foreseen for audit of agricultural expenditure under chapter 05 07 and EUR 45,8 million for policy strategy and coordination under chapter 05 08. 

For details, please see annex 1.

1.4.        Revenue assigned to EAGF[2]

In accordance with Article 34 of Council Regulation (EC) No 1290/2005 on the financing of the Common Agricultural Policy revenue originating from financial corrections under conformity clearance decisions, from irregularities and from the milk levy are designated as revenue assigned to the financing of EAGF expenditure. According to these rules, assigned revenue can be used to cover the financing of any EAGF expenditure. In the event part of this revenue is not used, then, this part will be automatically carried forward to the following budget year.

At the time of establishment of the 2012 budget, an estimate of the revenue was made both for the amount expected to be collected in the course of the 2012 budget year as well as of the amount which was expected to be carried over from the budget year 2011 into 2012. This estimate amounted to EUR 1 010 million and it was taken into consideration when the Budgetary Authority adopted the 2012 budget. Specifically:

– Revenue from the conformity clearance corrections and from irregularities was estimated at EUR 600 million and EUR 150 million respectively while the receipts from the milk levy were estimated at EUR 55 million. Thus, the total amount of assigned revenue expected to be collected in the course of the 2012 budget year was estimated at EUR 805 million.

– The amount of assigned revenue expected to be carried over from the budget year 2011 into 2012 was estimated at EUR 205 million.

In the 2012 budget, the Commission assigned this initially estimated assigned revenue of EUR 1 010 million to two schemes. Specifically:

– EUR 310 million was assigned to the operational funds for producer organisations in the fruits and vegetables sector, and

– EUR 700 million to the single payment scheme (direct aids).

For these two schemes, the Budgetary Authority eventually voted appropriations amounting to EUR 496 million and to EUR 30 472 million respectively in accordance with the Commission's proposals. The sum of the voted appropriations and the assigned revenue mentioned above corresponds to a total estimate of available appropriations of EUR 806 million for the operational funds for producer organisations in the fruits and vegetables sector and EUR 31 172 million for the single payment scheme.

1.5.        Temporary restructuring amounts in the sugar sector[3]

The temporary restructuring amounts in the sugar sector, as set out in article 11 of Council Regulation (EC) No 320/2006, are treated as assigned revenue intended to finance the sugar restructuring aid and other aids foreseen in the Sugar Restructuring Fund. For the marketing years 2006/07 up to 2008/09, these amounts related to the sugar, inulin syrup and isoglucose quantitative quotas held by operators in each Member State and they were paid by Member States into the Fund.

At the time of establishment of the 2012 budget an amount of EUR 832.2 million was expected to be carried over from the budget year 2011 into 2012.

1.6.        Part of the EAGF budget in total EU budget

The final EAGF budget's (commitment appropriations) part of the total EU budget for the period 2006–2012 appears in annex 2.

2.           CASH POSITION AND MANAGEMENT OF APPROPRIATIONS

2.1.        Management of appropriations

2.1.1.     Appropriations available for the 2012 financial year

In EUR ||

Expenditure section of budget (1) || Commitment appropriations || Payment appropriations || Revenue section of budget (AR) (2) || Forecasts

1. Initial appropriations for EAGF  of which || 43 969 637 305 || 43 875 978 049 || 1. Conformity clearance || 600 000 000

1a. Appropriations under shared management || 43 540 900 000 || 43 540 900 000 || 2. Irregularities || 150 000 000

1b. Appropriations under centralised  direct management (3) || 428 737 305 || 335 078 049 || 3. Super levy from milk producers || 55 000 000

2. Amending Budget 6/2012 || -65 420 000 || 17 000 000 || 4. Temporary restructuring amounts for sugar sector (4) || 0

3. Transfer to / out of EAGF in the year || 71 000 || 10 614 720 || Total forecast of AR || 805 000 000

4. Final appropriations for EAGF of which || 43 904 288 305 || 43 903 592 769 || ||

4a. Appropriations under shared management || 43 540 900 000 || 43 540 900 000 || ||

4b. Appropriations under centralised direct management || 363 388 305 || 362 692 769 || ||

(1)    Appropriations entered in the 2012 budget after deducting the expected assigned revenue to be collected in 2012 and the one carried over from 2011 to 2012 in accordance with Article 10 of the Council Regulation (EC) No 1605/2002. (2)    AR: Assigned revenue to be collected. There are no amounts of revenue entered on the revenue line (p.m.)[4], but the forecast amount is indicated in the budget comments. (3)    78% of commitment appropriations concern expenditure for veterinary and phyto-sanitary measures under policy area 17 - Health and Consumer Protection. The rest concern expenditure for policy strategy and coordination under policy area 05 - Agriculture and Rural Development (15%) and for fisheries markets under policy area 11 - Maritime Affairs and Fisheries (7%). (4) This revenue is used to provide appropriations for the payment of Sugar Restructuring Fund aids. This Fund has ended on 30/09/2012.

2.1.2.     Budget execution of appropriations available for the 2012 financial year

In EUR

|| Execution of commitment appropriations || Execution of payment appropriations

Shared management  (1) || 44 495 484 915.34 || 44 495 484 915.34

Expenditure under centralised direct management || 359 808 478.00 || 347 851 305.54

Total (including Sugar Restructuring Fund) Sugar Restructuring Fund Total (excluding Sugar Restructuring Fund) || 44 855 293 393.34 109 698 527.03 44 745 594 866.31 || 44 843 336 220.88 109 698 527.03 44 733 637 693.85

(1) Committed amounts. Commitments and payments less assigned revenue received for shared management: EUR 43 588 043 789.62.

For the financial year 2012, the actual amount of commitment appropriations used amounted to EUR 44 855 293 393.34 while that for payment appropriations amounted to EUR 44 843 336 220.88.

2.1.3.     Budget execution of voted appropriations - Expenditure under centralised direct management made by the Commission

In EUR ||

Expenditure under centralised direct management || Commitment appropriations || De-commitments || Payment appropriations || Carry over to 2013 (2)

Appropriations (C1) (1) || 363 388 305.00 || - || 362 692 769.11 || -

Execution (C1) || 358 622 779.47 || - || 341 045 358.37 || 16 140 424.02

Appropriations cancelled || 4 765 525.53 || - || 5 506 986.72 || -

(1) C1 denotes the budget's voted appropriations. This amount includes Amending Budget 6/2012 involving transfers to / out EAGF: EUR -65 349 000.00 for commitment appropriations and EUR 27 614 720.11 for payment appropriations (2) Carry over to 2013 only for non-differentiated appropriations

Commitment appropriations of EUR 363.4 million were foreseen for expenditure under centralised direct management in the 2012 budget. An amount of EUR 358.6 million was committed in 2012. The balance of these appropriations, EUR 4.8 million, was cancelled. 74.4% of commitment appropriations concern policy area 17-Veterinary and phyto-sanitary measures expenditure. The rest concern policy area 05-Agriculture and Rural Development (17.2%) and policy area 11-Fisheries (8.4%).

The majority of executed EAGF commitment appropriations regarding expenditure under direct management made by the Commission are differentiated appropriations. The automatic carry over to 2013, which relates only to non-differentiated appropriations, amounts to EUR 16.1 million.

2.2.        Monthly payments

2.2.1.     Monthly payments to Member States under shared management

2.2.1.1.  Monthly payments on the provision for expenditure

Council Regulation (EC) No 1290/2005 of 21 June 2005 on the financing of the Common Agricultural Policy[5] states in Article 15 that "monthly payments shall be made by the Commission … for expenditure performed by Member States' accredited paying agencies during the reference month". Monthly payments shall be made to each Member State at the latest on the third working day of the second month following that in which the expenditure is incurred.

The monthly payments are a reimbursement of net expenditure (after deduction of revenue) which has been already carried out and are made available on the basis of the monthly declarations forwarded by the Member States[6]. The monthly booking of expenditure and revenue is subject to checks and corrections on the basis of the detailed declaration[7]. Moreover, these payments will become final following the Commission's verifications under the accounting clearance of accounts procedure.

Payments made by the Member States from 16.10.2011 to 15.10.2012 are covered by the system for monthly payments. The remaining payments are made directly by the Commission for a limited number of measures.

For financial year 2012, the total net amount of monthly payments made, following the deduction of clearance and other corrections, was EUR 43 588 043 789.62.

2.2.1.2.  Decisions on monthly payments for 2012

For the financial year 2012, the Commission adopted twelve decisions on monthly payments. Furthermore, an additional monthly payment decision, adjusting those already granted for the total expenditure chargeable to the year, was adopted in December 2012.

3.           THE IMPLEMENTATION OF THE 2012 EAGF BUDGET

3.1.        The uptake of the EAGF budget appropriations

The 2012 budget's commitments were fully executed and payments appropriations at the rate of 99.9% after taking account of the assigned revenue of the year carried over and excluding the execution of the Sugar Restructuring Fund. 

Indeed, the implementation of the budget amounted to EUR 44 745.6 million. This expenditure was funded by the budget's initial appropriations; by using the entire amount of assigned revenue of EUR 441.5 million carried over from 2011 and; by using a part of the assigned revenue collected in 2012 amounting to EUR 408.9 million out of a total EUR 899.6 million. 

Within policy area 05-Agriculture and Rural Development, the expenditure for market measures amounted to EUR 3 406 million and for direct aids to EUR 40 880 million. The expenditure incurred for certain market measures and direct aids exceeded the budget’s voted appropriations and it was partly covered by transfers of appropriations from other items of the budget and partly by the revenue which was assigned to the EAGF budget.  

Furthermore, the aforementioned total implementation amount includes expenditure for policy area 11-Fisheries market measures of EUR 30.5 million as well as expenditure amounting to EUR 268.4 million for policy area 17-Veterinary and phyto-sanitary measures.

For details of the budget's implementation by Policy area, please see annex 3.

Annex 5 presents a breakdown of the expenditure on market measures, direct payments and audit of agricultural expenditure by article and by Member State.

4.           COMMENTS ON THE IMPLEMENTATION OF THE 2012 EAGF BUDGET

A brief commentary on the implementation of the 2012 EAGF budget's appropriations as well as on the use of the assigned revenue available in 2012 is presented hereafter based on details appearing in the annex 3.

4.1.        Chapter 05 02: Interventions in agricultural markets

4.1.1.     Introduction

Total payments for this chapter of the budget amounted to EUR 3 406 million and they were funded by the budget’s voted appropriations amounting to EUR 3 230.8 million and by assigned revenue amounting to EUR 177.4 million which was used to cover the expenditure incurred in the fruits and vegetables sector. The remaining balance of assigned revenue collected in 2012 amounting to EUR 143.4 million was carried over to 2013. (NB: Details for this sector appear in point 4.1.3 here below). In items where the budget's appropriations were under-spent, the available appropriations were transferred to other items of the budget in order to cover additional expenditure as needed.

4.1.2.     Food programmes

Member States implemented almost fully the 2012 plan for food distribution to the most deprived persons. In addition, Member States paid outstanding balances for administrative and transport costs for previous years' plans. This resulted in an over-execution of the 2012 budget's appropriations by EUR 15.1 million.    

4.1.3.     Fruits and vegetables  

Expenditure for this sector amounted to EUR 1 071.2 million and its over-implementation was primarily due to the expenditure incurred by Member States for the aid to producer groups for preliminary recognition because of the large number of producer groups which have entered this scheme following the Member States’ notification in January 2011 which was the basis for the 2012 budgetary estimate. As regards operational funds for producer organisations, Member States expenditure was smaller compared to the 2012 budget’s estimated needs because their payments of first instalments for plans approved for 2012 were lower than initially estimated and they did not eventually pay an estimated residual amount under the E-coli measures. Finally, for the School Fruit Scheme, certain Member States incurred expenditure which remained below their budgetary allocation for the school year 2011/12 while for the school year 2012/2013, which started on 01/08/2012, no expenditure was incurred by Member States by the end of the 2012 budget year. This expenditure will be made and declared in the course of the 2013 budget.

4.1.4.     Products of the wine-growing sector

The main measure funded in this sector is the national support programmes for wine for which two Member States incurred slightly lower expenditure compared to the amounts foreseen in their programmes. However, all other programmes foreseen under this scheme were fully implemented, resulting in an overall implementation of more than 98,4% of the foreseen 2012 appropriations. Member States incurred lower expenditure for the payment of still outstanding balances for the grubbing up scheme, terminated in 2011, compared to the amount foreseen in the budget. 

4.1.5.     Milk and milk products

The sector's under-implementation was primarily due to the lower expenditure incurred by Member States for the private storage aid for butter because of the lower volume of butter stored under this scheme and for school milk because the quantities distributed were lower than the quantities retained in the 2012 budget. However, it should be recalled that the 2012 budget for this item was increased by EUR 9 million by the Budgetary Authority compared to the initial needs of EUR 81 million requested by the Commission in its Amending Letter No 3/2012.

4.1.6.     Beef and veal

The decrease in the export refund rates for meat and live animals that took place in April 2012 led to the budget's under-execution in this article by EUR 7.5 million for exports of fresh and frozen meat and by EUR 1.3  million  for exports of live animals.  

4.2.        Chapter 05 03: Direct Aids

The voted appropriations for this chapter of the 2012 budget amounted to EUR 40 510.7 million while payments amounted to approximately EUR 40 880 million. This level of 2012 EAGF expenditure was higher compared to the level of 2011 mainly because of the continuing phasing-in of these aids for the EU-12 in that year. A part of the single payment scheme was foreseen to be funded by assigned revenue, thus, leading to this apparent over-implementation which was covered by this revenue as foreseen. Transfers of voted appropriations from other items of the budget covered the expenditure incurred for certain other schemes in this chapter.

4.3.        Chapter 05 07: Audit of agricultural expenditure

4.3.1.     Article 05 07 01: Control of agricultural expenditure

This article mainly includes the amounts credited to the EAGF budget through the corrections from accounting clearance of accounts and from the non-respect of deadlines for payments to beneficiaries. However, this year the Commission made overall positive corrections to Member States' accounts amounting to approximately EUR 28.5 million including the negative corrections imposed to Member States from the penalties for non-respecting payment deadlines under budget item 05 07 01 06. The 2012 budget, adopted by the Budgetary Authority, amounted to                           – EUR 200 million for the negative clearance of acounts corrections in the same budget item. The Commission closed this account by transferring voted appropriations amounting to EUR 228.6 million from other items of the budget where under-execution has been incurred.

With regard to the conformity clearance of previous years' accounts, positive corrections amounting to EUR 36.2 million were made by the Commission within the year. The 2012 budget did not retain any appropriations for such positive corrections which were eventually funded by transferring voted appropriations of the same amount from other items of the budget.

5.           IMPLEMENTATION OF ASSIGNED REVENUE

5.1.        Revenue assigned to EAGF

The assigned revenue actually carried over from 2011 into 2012, amounted to EUR 441.5 million and has entirely been used in financing expenditure of the 2012 budget year in accordance with article 10 of the Financial Regulation. This amount covered expenditure of EUR 10.8 million for the operational funds for producer organisations in the fruits and vegetables sector and of EUR 430.7 million for the single payment scheme.

As far as the assigned revenue collected in 2012, annex 4-I shows that this revenue amounted to EUR 899.6 million and it originated from:

– The corrections of the conformity clearance procedure which amounted to approximately EUR 674.8 million.

– The receipts from irregularities which amounted to approximately EUR 160.7 million.

– The milk levy collections which amounted to approximately EUR 64.1 million.

A part of the assigned revenue collected in 2012 amounting to EUR 408.9 million was used within the year. An amount of approximately EUR 166.5 million was used to cover expenditure incurred within the year for the operational funds for producer organisations in the fruits and vegetables sector while the balance of EUR 242.4 million was used to cover expenditure incurred within the year for direct aids.

The balance of the assigned revenue collected in 2012 amounting to EUR 490.7 million was automatically carried over into the 2013 budget in order to fund budgetary needs of that year.

For details, please see annexes 4-I and 4-II.

5.2.        Assigned revenue concerning temporary restructuring amounts in sugar sector

In line with the legislation, no new temporary restructuring amounts have been collected from the Member States since November 2009. However, an amount of EUR 7.8 million was declared in 2012 for irregularities. Therefore, the total assigned revenue available to the Sugar Restructuring Fund equals to the aforementioned amount plus the amount of EUR 856.8 million which was carried over from 2011 and which was higher than the amount of EUR 832.2 million foreseen in the 2012 budget as Member States made payments at the end of 2011 which were lower than expected. After reimbursing Member States the net amount of EUR 109.7 million incurred for Sugar Restructuring Fund aids (see point 6.3 below), the balance of approximately EUR 754.9 million remained available after the temporary Restructuring Fund ended on 30 September 2012. In accordance with Article 1(3) of Regulation (EC) 320/2006, this amount became assigned revenue to EAGF.

For details please see annexes 4-I and 4-II.

5.3.        Sugar Restructuring Fund

The reimbursements to Member States for payments made for aids concerning restructuring measures, for diversification aids or for aids to sugar refining were for a net amount of EUR 109.7 million These aids were reimbursed to Member States from the assigned revenue amount mentioned in point 5.2 above. 

For details, please see annexes 3.

6.           BREAKDOWN BY TYPE OF EXPENDITURE

The total EAGF expenditure amounts to EUR 44 745.6 million (excluding the Sugar Restructuring Fund). Hereafter, this expenditure is presented broken down into the main reporting categories along with the percentage that these represent in the total EAGF expenditure for 2012:

Storage

Expenditure for storage amounted to EUR 17.4 million. This amount mainly represents the expenditure incurred for the private storage of butter and olive oil.

Export refunds

Spending on export refunds amounted to EUR 146.7 million, i.e.: 0.3% of the total and it related mainly to beef, poultry, pig-meat, eggs and non-annex I products.

Other market measures

In addition to storage and export refunds, the expenditure for other market measures amounted to EUR 3 344.5 million, i.e.: 7.5% of the year's total. This category covers expenditure mainly relating to cereals, food programmes, olive oil, fruit and vegetables, wine, POSEI and dried fodder, milk and milk products, beef and veal and pig meat. This expenditure incorporates other minor amounts and it includes the corrections arising from the financial clearance of accounts.

Direct payments

Expenditure for direct payments amounted to EUR 40 880 million, i.e.: 91.4% of the total.

Direct expenditure under centralised management

This expenditure amounting to EUR 359.8 million, i.e.: 0.8% was paid directly by the Commission and it mostly covered the expenditure relating to veterinary and phyto-sanitary measures as well as to farm accounting, surveys on farm structures, information on the CAP etc.

Rural development under ex-EAGGF-Guarantee

No commitment appropriations can be made anymore for these programmes. Member States are now closing these programmes and they recover unduly paid amounts. The final net amount recovered under this article was equal to EUR 2.8 million.

The evolution of this breakdown by type of expenditure for the period 2007-2012 is presented in annex 6.

[1]               This procedure is presented in annex 1.

[2]               These amounts are not entered in the revenue lines of the budget (article 670 for the revenue assigned to the EAGF) but they are mentioned in the budgetary remarks for this article.

[3]               These amounts are not entered in the revenue lines of the budget (article 680 for the temporary restructuring amounts for the sugar sector) but they are mentioned in the budgetary remarks for this article.

[4]               p.m.: "pour mémoire".

[5]               OJ L 209 of 11.8.2005, p. 1.

[6]               These monthly declarations of expenditure are transmitted by the Member States by the declaration of the 10th of the month N+1.

[7]               The detailed declarations are transmitted monthly by the Member States (by table 104) on the 20th of the month N+1.