Treaty establishing the European Coal and Steel Community - Convention on the Transitional Provisions - Part Three - General safeguards - Chapter 2 - Special provisions for coal - Belgium - Article 26

1. It is agreed that net Belgian coal production:

- need not be reduced each year by more than 3% as compared with the level of the preceding year if total Community production is the same or is above the level of the preceding year; or,

- if total Community production is below the level of the preceding year, need not be lower than the figure obtained by applying to the level of Belgian production in the preceding year less 3% the same coefficient of decrease as that in total Community production.*

* Example - 1952, total Community production 250 million metric tons, total Belgian production 30 million metric tons; 1953, total Community production 225 million metric tons, i.e. coefficient of decrease 0.9. Hence, Belgian production in 1953 need not be lower than 30×0.97×0.9=26.19 million metric tons.

Of this reduction, 900 000 metric tons represents a permanent shift and the remaining 2 910 000 a downturn due to the business situation.

The Commission, as the body responsible for ensuring that the Community is kept regularly supplied, shall make an assessment of the long term production and sales prospects and, after consulting the Consultative Committee and the Council, shall make to the Belgian Government, for as long as the Belgian market is insulated under paragraph 3 of this Article, a recommendation as to the shifts in production levels which it finds possible on the basis of this assessment. The Belgian Government shall decide, in agreement with the Commission, what arrangements are to be made to cause these possible shifts to come about within the limits defined above.

2. The equalization arrangements shall be designed, from the beginning of the transitional period:

(a) to enable all consumers of Belgian coal within the common market to be charged prices more nearly in line with the ruling common market prices, reducing Belgian prices to the approximate figure of the estimated production costs at the end of the transitional period. The price list so fixed shall not be changed without the agreement of the Commission;

(b) to ensure that the Belgian steel industry is not prevented by the special arrangements for Belgian coal from being integrated into the commonmarket in steel and reducing its prices accordingly to the level ruling in that market.

The Commission shall periodically fix the amount of such additional equalization payments in respect of Belgian coal sold to the Belgian steel industry as it considers necessary for this purpose in view of all the operational factors involved for that industry, taking care, however, that these equalization payments do not bear unfairly on the steel industries of the neighbouring countries. Also, having regard to the price of the coke used by the Belgian steel industry to below the delivered price it could obtain if supplied with coke from the Ruhr;

(c) to allow, in respect of exports of Belgian coal within the common market considered by the Commission to be necessary in view of the production and demand prospects in the Community, additional equalization payments to cover 80% of the difference which the Commission finds to exist between the pithead price plus carriage to destination of Belgian coal and of coal from other Community countries.

3. The Belgian Government may, by way of derogation from the provisions of Article 9 of this Convention, retain or institute, under the supervision of the Commission, machinery for insulating the Belgian market from the common market.

Imports of coal from third countries shall require the approval of the Commission.

These special arrangements shall end as provided below.

4. The Belgian Government undertakes to remove the machinery for insulating the Belgian market under paragraph 3 of this Article by the end of the transitional period at the latest. If the Commission considers it neces sary by reason of exceptional circumstances not now foreseeable, it may, after consulting the Consultative Committee and with the assent of the Council, allow the Belgian Government an additional year which may be extended by a further year.

The integration thus provided for shall take place after consultation between the Belgian Government and the Commission, which shall both determine the ways and means therefor; these may include allowing the Belgian Government, notwithstanding Article 4(c) of the Treaty, to grant subsidies covering the extra operating costs due to the natural conditions of the coalfields, taking into account any charges due to manifest disequilibria which add to these costs. The procedure for granting of subsidies and their maximum amount shall require the approval of the Commission, which shall see to it that the maximum amount of subsidies and the tonnage subsidized are lowered as quickly as possible, taking into account the facilities for readaptation and the extension of the common market to products other than coal and steel, and ensuring that the scale of such production cutbacks as may be made does not give rise to fundamental disturbances in the Belgian economy.

The Commission shall every two years submit to the Council for approval proposals as to the tonnage which may be subsidized.