98/524/EC: Commission Decision of 28 July 1998 amending Decision 94/279/EC on the indicative allocation by Member States of the commitment appropriations from the Structural Funds for the agricultural part of Objective 5a except for those fields covered by Objective 1 as defined in Council Regulation (EEC) No 2052/88 for the period 1994 to 1999 (notified under document number C(1998) 2330) (Text with EEA relevance)
Date: 1998-07-28
Institutions: European Commission
Subjects: EU Member State, Structural Funds, commitment of expenditure, common agricultural policy, distribution of aid, financing policy

L 233/32

EN

Official Journal of the European Communities

20. 8. 98

COMMISSION DECISION

of 28 July 1998

amending Decision 94/279/EC on the indicative allocation by Member States of
the commitment appropriations from the Structural Funds for the agricultural
part of Objective 5a except for those fields covered by Objective 1 as defined in
Council Regulation (EEC) No 2052/88 for the period 1994 to 1999

(notified under document number C(1998) 2330)

(Text with EEA relevance)

(98/524/EC)

THE COMMISSION OF THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES,

Having regard to the Treaty establishing the European
Community,

Having regard to Council Regulation (EEC) No 2052/88
of 24 June 1988 on the tasks of the Structural Funds and
their effectiveness and on coordination of their activities
between themselves and with the operations of the Euro-
pean Investment Bank and the other existing financial
instruments (1), as last amended by Regulation (EC) No
3193/94 (2), and in particular Article 12(4) thereof,

the indicative allocation of

Whereas, pursuant to Article 12(4) of Council Regulation
(EEC) No 2052/88,
the
the Structural Funds which may be
resources of
committed between 1994 and 1999 for the agricultural
part of Objective 5(a) which does not fall under Objective
1 was established by Commission Decision 94/279/EC (3);

Whereas by the abovementioned Decision an amount of
ECU 518 million, expressed in 1994 prices, was set aside
from the total amount of ECU 5 149 million to ensure in
particular that measures implemented before the entry
into force of Council Regulation (EEC) No 2081/93 (4) are
funded; whereas the amount set aside was furthermore
intended to take into account the special circumstances
which could come up in the context of the examination
of financial forecasts to be presented by Member States;

Whereas an amount of ECU 401 million has been used
for funding measures implemented before the entry into
force of Regulation (EEC) No 2081/93; whereas an
amount of ECU 124,619 million, expressed in 1998
prices, from the total amount set aside in 1994, has not
yet been allocated;

adopting Decision 96/388/EC (5),

the
Whereas by
Commission accepted the United Kingdom’s request to
withdraw the application of measures under Council

Regulation (EEC) No 866/90 of 29 March 1990 on
improving the processing and marketing conditions for
agricultural products (6), recast by Regulation (EC) No
951/97 (7), in England from the 1 March 1996; whereas by
this Decision commitment
appropriations of ECU
182,318 million, expressed in 1998 prices, were released
and surrendered to the Funds; whereas, consequently, the
initially allocated to the
commitment appropriations
United Kingdom in 1994 have to be reduced by this
amount;

Whereas as a result of the above matter, a remaining sum
amounting to ECU 306,937 million, expressed in 1998
prices,
is available to be allocated from the Structural
Funds for the agricultural part of Objective 5a, outside of
Objective 1 and 6 regions;

Whereas in the context of the update of expenditure
forecasts for measures under Council Regulation (EC) No
950/97 (8) and during the monitoring of the implementa-
tion of measures under Regulation (EC) No 951/57 a
number of Member States identified financial needs for
the implementation of these measures which exceed the
initially estimated amounts;

in particular

Whereas the requests of these Member States have been
three
examined taking into account
elements: the progress in implementation of the relevant
measures within the current programming period, the
availability of national co-financing, and the proof of
sufficient absorption capacity for the additional financial
resources; whereas this examination allowed the identi-
fication of the needs for additional financial resources in
the concerned Member States;

Whereas Article 6(2) of Regulation (EEC) No 2052/88 in
conjunction with Article 26 of Council Regulation (EEC)
No 4253/88 (9) requires the evaluation of Community

(1) OJ L 185, 15. 7. 1988, p. 9.
(2) OJ L 337, 24. 12. 1994, p. 1.
(3) OJ L 120, 11. 5. 1994, p. 50.
(4) OJ L 193, 31. 7. 1993, p. 5.
(5) OJ L 155, 28. 6. 1996, p. 58.

(6) OJ L 91, 6. 4. 1990, p. 1.
(7) OJ L 142, 2. 6. 1997, p. 22.
(8) OJ L 142, 2. 6. 1997, p. 1.
(9) OJ L 374, 31. 12. 1988, p. 1.

20. 8. 98

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Official Journal of the European Communities

L 233/33

structural operations in order to gauge their effectiveness
and whereas the latter Article sets out that evaluations are
the joint responsibility of
the Member State and the
Commission; whereas Artricle 5(2)(e) of Regulation (EEC)
technical assistance,
No 2052/88 defines support
including the measures to evaluate operations, as a form
of financial assistance which may be provided;

for

Whereas contrary to the other structural interventions, the
programming of measures under Regulation (EC) No
foresee
951/97, outside Objective 1 regions, did not
support for technical assistance; whereas the requirement
to carry out an ex-post evaluation of the previous period
1991 to 1993 as well as a mid-term and ex-post evaluation
of the ongoing period 1994 to 1999 will cause additional
costs to be borne by Member States; whereas on the
occasion of the discussion of the evaluation of measures
under Regulation (EC) No 951/97 and Regulation (EEC)
No 867/90 in the meeting of the Committee on Agricul-
tural Structures and Rural Development of 28 January
1997, Member States requested the expenditure for evalu-
ation to be co-financed by the Funds; whereas the use of
ECU 4 million for this purpose is considered to be justi-
fied;

Whereas, taking into account the justified needs for attri-
bution to Objective 5a, an amount of ECU 117 million is
not required for the reinforcement of interventions in the
framework of Objective 5a; whereas from this remaining
sum an amount of ECU 37 million is transferred to the
PEACE initiative to ensure a part of the financing of the
PEACE programme for Northern Ireland and with that to
contribute to the peace process in this region;

Whereas for the other part of the remaining amount,
Portugal, Italy and Germany submitted requests asking for
a transfer of unused financial resources under Objective
5a to contribute to the financing of structural interven-
tions in the framework of Objective 5b and Objective 1
programmes which are designed to remedy the damages
which were caused by natural disaster; whereas these
requests are considered to be justified as they involve the
use of the unused financial resources within the scope of
application of the Structural Funds for actions designed to
restore the concerned rural regions;

Whereas, by letter of 14 May 1998, the Italian authorities
requested the transfer of ECU 65,000 million which were
initially allocated to the measures under Objective 5a,
referred to in the third subparagraph of Article 31(1) of
Regulation (EC) No
operational
950/97,
programmes under Objective 5b for the regions Umbria
and Marche; whereas this request is considered justified as
the financial resources requested are intended to con-
tribute to the financing of structural interventions aiming
to remedy the damages which were caused by natural

the

to

disaster; whereas the initial allocation of commitment
appropriations from the Structural Funds for the agricul-
tural part of Objective 5a except for those fields covered
by Objective 1 to Italy has to be reduced by the afore-
mentioned amount;

Whereas the indicative allocation set out in the Annex
hereto satisfies the criteria laid down in Article 12(4) of
Regulation (EEC) No 2052/88 and whereas the new
distribution between Member States shall not modify the
weightings of the past, in particular with regard to the
allocation of resources in the future,

HAS ADOPTED THIS DECISION:

Article 1

Article 1 of Decision 94/279/EC is replaced by the
following text:

‘Article 1

For the period 1994 to 1999, the initial indicative
breakdown as decided in 1994 and the modified in-
dicative breakdown, which is subject to the present
Decision, between the Member States, of the commit-
ment appropriations for the agricultural part of Ob-
jective 5a, except for those fields covered by Objective
1 as defined in Regulation (EEC) No 2052/88, are set
out in the Annex.

Article 1a

An amount of ECU 4 million is set aside to allow the
support for technical assistance for the ex-post evalu-
ation of the period 1991 to 1993, the mid-term review
and the ex-post evaluation of the period 1994 to 1999
from commitment appropriations available for the
agricultural part of Objective 5a except for those fields
covered by Objective 1. The modalities of the support
for evaluation shall be defined in a separate Commis-
sion Decision'.

Article 2

This Decision is addressed to the Member States.

Done at Brussels, 28 July 1998.

For the Commission

Franz FISCHLER

Member of the Commission

L 233/34

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Official Journal of the European Communities

20. 8. 98

ANNEX

Commitment appropriations for the agricultural part of Objective 5a except for those fields
covered by Objective 1 for the period 1994 to 1999

Member State

Initially allocated amounts in 1994
(1994 prices)

(ECU million)

Amounts taking into account addi-
tional allocation, reduction and trans-
fers (1998 prices)

Belgium

Denmark

Germany

Spain

France

Italy

Luxembourg

Netherlands

United Kingdom

170,000

127,000

1 068,000

326,000

1 742,000

680,000

39,000

118,000

361,000

Total

4 631,000

187,648

139,734

1 146,423

435,593

1 813,617

637,720

40,291

121,982

201,324

4 724,332