Opinion on the proposal for a Council Regulation (EC) establishing a system of compensation for the additional costs incurred in the marketing of certain fishery products from the Azores,Madeira, the Canary Islands and the French department of Guiana as a result of their very remote location

(95/C 102/06)

On 28 November 1994, the Council decided to consult the Economic and Social Committee, under Articles 43 and 198 of the Treaty establishing the European Community, on the abovementioned proposal.

The Section for Agriculture and Fisheries, which was responsible for preparing the Committee's work on the subject, adopted its Opinion on 10 January 1995. The Rapporteur was Mr Bento Gonçalves.

At its 322nd Plenary Session (meeting of 25 January 1995), the Economic and Social Committee unanimously adopted the following Opinion.

1. Introduction

1.1. The structural backwardness of the EU's outermost regions justifies Community action to promote their economic and social development and enable their populations to play a full part in the internal market.

1.2. The remote and insular nature of these regions is further justification for special aid to offset the permanent geographical disadvantages facing producers there who wish to market their products. The nature of these disadvantages means that support cannot be provided under the Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance.

1.2.1. The Committee approves the proposal to finance the aid out of the EAGGF Guarantee Section, given that the aid takes the form of market support.

1.3.

Legal basis

1.3.1. The legal basis of the proposal is Article 43 of the EC Treaty, to which the Declaration on the outermost regions of the Community lends added weight. This Declaration, which is annexed to the Treaty on European Union as Declaration No 26, concerns the adoption of measures to strengthen employment and economic and social cohesion in these regions. The Maastricht Conference made a number of specific undertakings in the Declaration:

'DECLARATION

on the outermost regions of the Community

The Conference acknowledges that the outermost regions of the Community (the French overseas departments, Azores and Madeira and Canary Islands) suffer from major structural backwardness compounded by several phenomena (remoteness, island status, small size, difficult topography and climate, economic dependence on a few products), the permanence and combination of which severely restrain their economic and social development.

It considers that, while the provisions of the Treaty establishing the European Community and secondary legislation apply automatically to the outermost regions, it is nonetheless possible to adopt specific measures to assist them inasmuch and as long as there is an objective need to take such measures with a view to the economic and social development of those regions. Such measures should have as their aim both the completion of the internal market and a recognition of the regional reality to enable the outermost regions to achieve the average economic and social level of the Community.'

1.3.2. Such is the legal basis underpinning the support which the EU grants these regions via a number of instruments:

- Council Decision 89/687/EEC of 22 December 1989 establishing the Poseidom programme for the French overseas departments ();

- Council Decision 91/314/EEC of 26 June 1991 establishing the Poseican programme for the Canary Islands ();

- Council Decision 91/315/EEC of 26 June 1991 establishing the Poseima programme for the Azores and Madeira ();

- Commission Decision of 30 July 1992 establishing Community aid for the abovementioned programmes ()();

- Council Regulation (EC) No 1503/94 of 27 June 1994 establishing a system of compensation for the abovementioned regions, designed to regulate the specific implementing provisions ()();

- Commission Regulation (EC) No 2954/94 of 5 December 1994 setting detailed rules for application of Council Regulation (EC) No 1503/94, and defining, in cooperation with the Member States, the procedures for granting EU financial resources and for monitoring their application ()().

2. General comments

2.1. The Committee supports the proposal.

2.2. The proposal will put aid on a more permanent footing and thus enable economic agents to plan their activities more effectively. The mechanism proposed in Article 5 also provides an appropriate way of monitoring results.

2.2.1. The more permanent nature of the aid will do much to safeguard local employment and bring about the desired social improvements.

2.3. The Committee asks the Council and Commission:

a)

to consider the promotion of actions to diversify these regions' productive structure; this should be made a regional policy objective and should back up the support provided by the present proposal;

b)

to ensure that the aid goes to small-scale fisheries, bearing in mind Article 3 of Commission Regulation (EC) No 2954/94 of 5 December 1994 ()();

c)

to extend the scope of the Regulation to other species.

3. Specific comments

3.1.

Article 5

- The Committee regrets that the Commission has not included it among the official recipients of the report on the implementation of the measures provided for in the Regulation.

- The ESC is a Community body comprising representatives of all the socio-economic interest groups concerned, and its opinion on these matters is important.

Done at Brussels, 25 January 1995.

The Chairman

of the Economic and Social Committee

Carlos FERRER

() OJ No L 399, 30. 12. 1989, p. 39.

() OJ No L 171, 29. 6. 1991, p. 5.

() OJ No L 171, 29. 6. 1991, p. 10.

() OJ No L 248, 28. 8. 1992, p. 73.

() OJ No L 162, 30. 6. 1994, p. 8.

() OJ No L 312, 6. 12. 1994, p. 3.