WRITTEN QUESTION E-1774/00 by Wolfgang Ilgenfritz (NI) to the Commission. Net contributors in the European Union.
Date: 2000-06-07
Institutions: European Parliament, Provisional data
Subjects: Member States' contribution, net contributor, net recipient

6.3.2001

EN

Official Journal of the European Communities

C 72 E/115

(2001/C 72 E/144)

WRITTEN QUESTION E-1774/00

by Wolfgang Ilgenfritz (NI) to the Commission

(7 June 2000)

Subject: Net contributors in the European Union

Which countries are net contributors and which are net recipients in the European Union?

How are the contributions by individual Member States calculated in the European Union?

What are the payments by and to the Member States for the period 1995 to 2000?

Answer given by Mrs Schreyer on behalf of the Commission

(4 July 2000)

the budgetary balance of

the Member States in the
There is no universally accepted definition of
Community budget and, consequently, it is often difficult to classify Member States, formally speaking,
into groups of net recipients and net contributors. This is especially difficult for those Member States
whose balance is very close to zero with the result that changes in the concept of the budgetary balance
used turn a Member State from a net recipient to a net contributor. A clear example is the case of Belgium
which, when including administrative Community expenditure in the data, appears to be a net recipient
but is a net contributor when administrative Community expenditure is excluded. These and other
difficulties with the definition of the budgetary balance have been discussed in the Commission report on
the operation of the own resources system which is available on the Europa server in the World Wide
Web, in the following address:
http://europa.eu.int/comm/dg19/en/agenda2000/ownresources/.

The report also includes tables of own resources contributions to and receipts from the Community budget
by Member State as well as estimates of budgetary balances according to different definitions for the period
1992-1997 or 1998. Updated estimates of budgetary balances to 1998 can be found in the statistical
annex of the June 1999 Commission services report on the allocation of 1998 EU operating expenditure
by Member State, also available on the Europa service in the World Wide Web, in the following address:
http://europa.eu.int/comm/dg19/pdf/agenda2000/statdepenses98pdf.

The rules governing the own resources system are set out in the 1994 own resources Decision currently in
force (a new own resources decision will come into force on 1 January 2001). Community own resources
are the so-called traditional own resources (TOR) essentially customs duties and agricultural levies collected
by the Member States and transferred to the Community budget after withholding 10 % of the amounts
collected to cover collection costs, the VAT resource consisting of VAT revenues determined by the
application of a call rate on the harmonised VAT base of each Member State, and the gross national
product (GNP) resource which is called according to a rate necessary to balance the Community budget.
the
The own resources contributions of
preparation of the annual Community budget. Annual own resources contributions can be read from the
Community draft budget as well as from the final budget.

the Member States are determined in the framework of

The latest data available for own resources contributions concern the year 2000 budget and the year 2001
preliminary draft budget and can be read directly from the budget documents. Data for expenditure by
Member State are only available up to 1998 and can be found in the documents available at the World
Wide Web addresses mentioned previously.