Proposal for a Council Regulation (EC) amending Council Regulation (EEC) No 571/88 on the organization of Community surveys on the structure of agricultural holdings (96/C 293/07) COM(96) 371 final - 96/0208(CNS)

(Submitted by the Commission on 26 July 1996)

THE COUNCIL OF THE EUROPEAN UNION,

Having regard to the Treaty establishing the European Community, and in particular Article 43 thereof,

Having regard to the proposal from the Commission,

Having regard to the opinion of the European Parliament,

Whereas Council Regulation (EEC) No 571/88 of 29 February 1988 on the organization of Community surveys on the structure of agricultural holdings between 1988 and 1997 (1), as last amended by Commission Decision 96/170/EC (2) provides for a programme of four Community surveys on the structure of agricultural holdings in the period 1988 to 1997; whereas this survey programme follows on from a series of Community surveys on agricultural structures, the first of which was conducted in 1966/67; whereas the Regulation in question also provides for the implementation of the Eurofarm data bank for storing, processing and disseminating the surveys results;

Whereas trends in the structure of agricultural holdings are an important factor in determining the development of the common agricultural policy; whereas these structure surveys should therefore be continued after 1997;

Whereas experience in conducting the previous structure surveys in the Community has shown that the survey programme and methodology of the Community structure surveys should remain unchanged wherever possible and should be adjusted in future surveys only in so far as this is necessary to take account of new developments in agriculture, in particular in farming techniques, and/or to take account of the new orientation of the common agricultural policy and of the new information requirements of the European Union and the Member States;

Whereas Regulation (EEC) No 571/88 has been in accordance with these objectives; whereas it is necessary to extend the period of application of this Regulation for another ten years covering the period from 1998 to 2007;

Whereas structure statistics broken down in small regional detail are increasingly needed in the context of the reform of the common agricultural policy, but also for regional policy purposes; whereas it is therefore necessary to organize and conduct structural surveys in such a way that disaggregates survey results can be provided at district level; consequently, the survey costs will be higher and it will be necessary to increase the Community contribution towards costs of the 1999/2000 basic survey;

Whereas, in order to carry out these surveys, both the Member States and the Community will need to set aside over a number of years substantial budgetary resources, a large proportion of which will have to be used to meet the information requirements of the Community institutions; whereas continuing provision should therefore be made in the Community budget for the necessary funds for a Community contribution towards the survey costs and towards the processing and dissemination of the survey results via the Eurofarm system;

Whereas for the purpose of implementing the present regulation and in particular the Eurofarm project, the individual data transmitted to the Statistical Office of the European Communities must be treated in accordance with the contents of Council Regulation (Euratom, EEC) No 1588/90 of 11 June 1990 on the transmission of data subject to statistical confidentiality to the Statistical Office of the European Communities (3);

Whereas to carry out these surveys successfully, the close and trusting cooperation between the Member States and the Commission must continue, in particular via the Standing Committee for Agricultural Statistics set up by Decision 72/279/EEC (4),

HAS ADOPTED THIS REGULATION:

Article 1

Council Regulation (EEC) No 571/88 is amended as follows:

1. in the title of Regulation (EEC) No 571/88, the words 'between 1988 and 1997` are deleted;

2. the recitals are amended as follows:

(a) in the fifth recital, the words 'during the period 1993 to 1997` are deleted.

(b) the ninth recital is replaced by the following:

'Whereas, when the procedures to be employed for the Community censuses in 1989/90 and 1999/2000 are determined, account must be taken as far as possible of the recommendations of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) regarding world censuses of agriculture to be conducted sometime around 1990 and also around 2000.`;

3. in Article 1, the words '1988 and 1997` are replaced by the words '1988 and 2007`;

4. Article 2 is replaced by the following:

'In line with the FAO recommendation for world censuses of agriculture, Member States shall carry out a basic survey in one or more stages in the form of a general census (full survey) of all agricultural holdings, between 1 December 1988 and 1 March 1991 and between 1 December 1998 and 1 March 2001 respectively. These surveys shall relate to the crop year corresponding to the crop to be harvested in 1989 or 1990 and in 1999 or 2000.`;

5. Article 3 is amended as follows:

(a) in the first sentence, after the words 'The following surveys`, the words 'interim surveys` are inserted in brackets;

(b) the following is added:

'(d) between 1 December 2002 and 1 March 2004, covering the crop year corresponding to the crop to be harvested in 2003 (structure survey 2003);

(e) between 1 December 2004 and 1 March 2006, covering the crop year corresponding to the crop to be harvested in 2005 (structure survey 2005);

and

(f) between 1 December 2006 and 1 March 2008, covering the crop year corresponding to the crop to be harvested in 2007 (structure survey 2007).`;

6. Article 4 is amended as follows:

(a) The second indent and the words 'the districts referred to in Article 8 (for the basic survey only)` the deleted;

(b) the third indent becomes the second indent; after this indent, the words 'as last amended by Regulation (EEC) No 797/85` are replaced by the words 'as last amended by the Act of Accession of Austria, Finland and Sweden (¹);

(¹) OJ No L 1, 1. 1. 1995, p. 1.`

(c) between the third and fourth indents, the following is added as an additional indent:

'- the "objective zones" within the meaning of Council Regulation (EEC) No 2052/88 (¹), as last amended by Council Regulation (EEC) No 2081/93 (²) and Commission Decision No 94/197/EEC (³);

(¹) OJ No L 185, 15. 7. 1988, p. 9.

(²) OJ No L 193, 31. 7. 1993, p. 5.

(³) OJ No L 96, 14. 4. 1994, p. 1.`;

(d) after the fourth indent, after the words 'Decision 85/377/EEC (¹)` the following words are added:

'as last amended by Decision . . . (to be specified)

(¹) OJ No L 220, 17. 8. 1985, p. 1.`;

(e) At the end of the article, the following paragraph is added: 'The Member States take the necessary measures to ensure that samples are structured in a way which allows the use of one single coefficient per holding for raising the information collected by sampling.`;

7. Article 8 is amended as follows:

(a) In paragraph 1, the words '1993 to 1997` are replaced by the words '1993 to 2007`;

(b) After paragraph 1, the following new paragraph 2 is added:

'2. In the 1999/2000 basic survey, the geographic situation of each holding is defined by a code which allows for aggregation by territorial units lower than the survey-district level or at least by objective zones`.

(c) Paragraph 2 is replaced by the following paragraph 3:

'3. The definitions relating to the characteristics and to the delimitation and coding of regions, survey districts and other territorial units shall be fixed in accordance with the procedure laid down in Article 15`;

(d) The former paragraph 3 becomes paragraph 4.

(e) The footnotes (1), (2) and (3) are deleted;

8. Article 10 is amended as follows:

'Member States shall forward to the Statistical Office of the European Communities the information mentioned in Article 8 (1) obtained from the censuses and sample surveys in the form of individual data per holding, in accordance with the procedure described in Annex II, hereafter called Eurofarm project;

The Member States shall ensure that the data transferred in the Eurofarm standard record layout are complete and plausible, using the uniform checking conditions laid down by the Statistical Office of the European Communities after consultation of the competent committees and working parties; the checking tables mentioned in paragraph 9 of Annex II shall also be used for checking individual data`;

9. Article 14 (1) is amended as follows:

(a) In the first sentence the words 'in carrying out the basic survey and the surveys provided for in Article 3` are replaced by the words 'in carrying out the surveys provided for in Articles 2 and 3`;

(b) The maximum sums per survey concerning the Member States Austria, Finland and Sweden are inserted as follows:

'- ECU 600 000 for Sweden,

- ECU 700 000 for Finland,

- ECU 1 400 000 for Austria.`;

(c) Between the first and the second subparagraph, the following is inserted:

'For carrying out the 1999/2000 basic survey, the sums mentioned before are increased by 50 %.`;

(d) The second subparagraph of paragraph 1 becomes subparagraph 3; the word 'four` is deleted;

10. Article 14 (2) is amended as follows;

(a) After the word 'development`, the words 'maintenance, necessary adaptations` are added;

(b) After the words 'Eurofarm project`, the words 'including the dissemination of results` are added;

(c) The annual maximum for the development and maintenance of the Eurofarm system concerning the period 1999 to 2010 is fixed as follows:

'- ECU 700 000 for 1999 and 2000,

- ECU 550 000 for 2001 to 2010.`;

11. in Article 15 (2) the words 'by a majority of 54 votes` are replaced by the words 'by a majority of 62 votes`.

Article 2

Annex II of Regulation 571/88/EEC is amended as follows:

1. in paragraph 2, the first indent is replaced by the following:

'- the Individual Data Bank (BDI), which will contain the individual data not directly identifiable on all holdings (in the case of basic surveys) or data on all holdings or on a representative sample of holdings (in the case of interim surveys) which is sufficient to enable analyses to be carried out at the geographical levels mentioned in Article 4 of the Regulation.`;

2. in paragraph 3, the words 'Except in the case of Germany` are replaced by the words 'Except in case of the individual data of Germany concerning the 1988 to 1995 surveys`;

3. Paragraph 6 is amended as follows:

'By way of derogation, Germany will not forward individual data but tabular results corresponding to the BDT table programme mentioned under paragraph 2. This derogation expires after the surveys of the period 1988 to 1995.

Germany undertakes to centralise the individual data on a magnetic carrier in a single dataprocessing centre, within 12 months of completion of data collection in the field.`;

4. Paragraph 16 is replaced by the following:

'16. In the framework of their respective responsibilities and in accordance with Council Regulation (Euratom, EEC) No 1588/90, the Statistical Office of the European Communities and the Member States will establish rapid consultation procedures with a view to:

- ensuring the confidentiality and statistical reliability of the information prepared on the basis of the individual data,

- informing the Member States of the use made of these data.`

Article 3

This Regulation shall enter into force on the day following that of its publication in the Official Journal of the European Communities.

This Regulation shall be binding in its entirety and directly applicable in all Member States.

(1) OJ No L 56, 2. 3. 1988, p. 1.

(2) OJ No L 47, 24. 2. 1996, p. 23.

(3) OJ No L 151, 15. 6. 1990, p. 1.

(4) OJ No L 179, 7. 8. 1972, p. 1.