WRITTEN QUESTION E-0241/01 by Erik Meijer (GUE/NGL) to the Commission. Abuse by animal-meal exporters of discrepancies in trading statistics.
Date: 2001-02-07
Institutions: European Parliament, Provisional data
Subjects: application of EU law, bovine spongiform encephalopathy, cereal substitute, information, intra-EU trade, statistical method, trade statistics, trade volume, veterinary legislation

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to recruit controllers in order to deal with the expected shortfall. The Commission is preparing to put
forward proposals for laws in order to follow up the report(cid:146)s findings.

2.
Air-transport providers carry out their responsibilities within national airspace. There is efficient
cooperation among such companies, which means that the passage of aircraft from one national territory
to another is generally fluid. Nevertheless, the constraints on air traffic make an approach based on
national territories increasingly obsolete. Moreover the Commission is planning to regulate the use and
form of airspace in order to manage it as a continuum.

Civil traffic must use corridors that often do not permit optimum traffic organisation, more
3. and 4.
especially because of the need to by-pass areas used for military purposes. In certain Member States those
areas are large and constitute a genuine impediment even though this varies with time. It is felt that more
rational organisation of traffic would enable capacity to be increased by many multiples of 10 % in certain
cases. The Commission is funding a research project which will enable the gains in capacity to be expected
from organising traffic more rationally to be plotted more accurately.

5.
The Commission feels that the actual limits do not so much reside in air traffic control as in the lack
of airport capacity and in the need to soften the environmental impact of air transport. However, the
limits are not immutable: they depend, in particular, on any progress which may be achieved in improved
airport operation and in the scope for using secondary airports, and in reducing noise nuisances and the
emission of greenhouse gases.

6.
The Commission is seeking to strike a balance between these concerns and the need to have a high-
performance transport network in which air transport occupies a prominent place. It is currently drafting
a white paper on the development of transport policy which is intended to fuel a debate on congestion
and intermodal transport.

(2001/C 318 E/028)

WRITTEN QUESTION E-0108/01

by Dana Scallon (PPE-DE) to the Commission

(1 February 2001)

Subject: Failure of Ireland to appoint an ombudsman for farming

Why has Ireland not appointed an ombudsman for farming?

Answer given by Mr Fischler on behalf of the Commission

(20 February 2001)

The EC Treaty only foresees the nomination of a Community ombudsman. A national ombudsman for
agriculture is not an issue governed by any Community legislation and is therefore outside the competence
of the Commission.

The Honourable Member is requested to address the question to the Irish national authorities.

(2001/C 318 E/029)

WRITTEN QUESTION E-0241/01

by Erik Meijer (GUE/NGL) to the Commission

(7 February 2001)

Subject: Abuse by animal-meal exporters of discrepancies in trading statistics

1.
Can the Commission confirm that since customs checks were abolished, it has not been possible
since 1993 for reliable statistics to be compiled for the volume of products traded and transported across
internal European Union borders?

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Can the Commission further confirm date published in (cid:145)Le Monde(cid:146) showing that figures relating to
2.
the trade in animal meal on either side of the Franco-Belgian and Netherlands-Belgian borders coincided
up to 1992, but absolutely not thereafter, in that the Netherlands claims to have exported much more to
Belgium in 1993 and 1994 than Belgium received, and France imported much larger quantities of Belgian
animal meal than Belgium claims to have exported?

3.
Can the Commission confirm that publicly available data show that following the introduction of
domestic restrictions on the use of offal, the British offal industry managed to survive by sharply stepping
up its exports, to the extent that the quantities exported in 1989 were nearly four times greater than in
1988, while very strong growth in imports of Irish animal meal
into other EU Member States were
recorded over the same period?

Is the assumption not inescapable that, starting in1993, large quantities of British animal meal were
thereof

4.
shipped to the Netherlands and Belgium as Irish animal meal, and that a substantial part
subsequently found its way into France?

How will the Commission act to ensure that import and export statistics can no longer be falsified,
5.
and that there can no longer be any doubt concerning the origin of dangerous and controversial products
that are not wanted by consumers or processing firms?

Answer given by Mr Byrne on behalf of the Commission

(26 April 2001)

Completion of the single market in 1993 did indeed lead to the institution of a system for
1. and 2.
collecting statistical information on trade in goods between Member States (Intrastat) which was separate
from customs formalities and was based on direct collection from businesses. The system had teething
troubles for the first years following its introduction; in particular, most Member States had persistent
problems of non-response or late response by some businesses, which impaired the quality or availability
of the Community statistics. The situation has steadily improved and the system now allows a satisfactory
response to most users(cid:146) requirements, especially within the economic and monetary union.

However, Intrastat is ill-suited to accounting for trade flows at the level of individual traded products (over
10 000 products are listed and codified in the nomenclature), for two main reasons:

(cid:129) A threshold was established to minimise the burden on small and medium-sized firms (SMEs), while
ensuring certain quality standards. It exempts companies up to a certain annual volume of business
from making statistical returns on their trade. This loss of information is offset by adjustments to the
aggregated results. In 2001, for example, this threshold is € 245 000 in Belgium, € 225 000 in the
Netherlands and € 100 000 in France (where the same return is used for statistical and tax purposes).
The threshold arrangements of course have a direct impact on the accuracy of the results for a specific
item and on the comparison of trade between trading partners in the Community. Similarly, non-
response is offset in most Member States by adjustments which are not always specified at the most
detailed level of the nomenclature.

(cid:129) Whereas statistics were collected before 1993 for every cross-border movement on the basis of
customs declarations, the Intrastat system depends on statistical returns made a posteriori, e.g. on the
basis of suppliers(cid:146) invoices. Difficulties in identifying the Member State which is the real partner (the
state of dispatch or destination) are thus inherent in the system and necessarily affect the comparison
of (cid:145)mirror(cid:146) flows.

Animal meal currently falls under subheading 2301 10 00 of the Combined Nomenclature, which
comprises flours, meals and pellets, of meat or offal, unfit for human consumption; greaves. These are
obtained from the processing either of whole carcasses or of parts of carcasses (meat, offal) and the
content of this subheading cannot be specified in greater detail.

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the discrepancies in mirror statistics for intra-Community flows
Scrutiny of the figures shows that
increased substantially from 1993 onwards. Dispatches from the Netherlands to the Belgo-Luxembourg
Economic Union (BLEU) in 1993 and 1994 are indeed higher than the corresponding arrivals declared by
the BLEU. However, the reverse is true from 1995 onwards. The figures also show that arrivals from the
BLEU in France are indeed higher than the equivalent dispatches declared by the BLEU.

3. and 4.
allegations.

The information and data supplied are not adequate to allow the Commission to confirm these

Commission Decision 97/735/EC of 21 October 1997 concerning certain protection measures with
5.
regard to trade in certain types of mammalian animal waste (1) and Commission Decision 2001/9/EC of
29 December 2000 concerning control measures required for the implementation of Council Decision
2000/766/EC concerning certain protection measures with regard to transmissible spongiform encepha-
lopathies and the feeding of animal protein (2) lay down strict control rules to guarantee the traceability of
including meat-and-bone meal, within the Community.
the movements of processed animal proteins,
Commission experts from the Food and Veterinary Office carry out regular on-the-spot checks in all
Member States to verify the correct implementation of Community legislation. Should it appear to the
Commission after establishing the facts that a Member State is not
the
Commission is prepared to take all necessary action within its power in order to secure compliance with
Community law.

fulfilling its obligations,

(1) OJ L 294, 28.10.1997. Decision last amended by Council Decision 1999/534/EC of 19 July 1999 (OJ L 204,

4.8.1999).

(2) OJ L 2, 5.1.2001. Decision last amended by Commission Decision 2001/165/EC of 27 February 2001 (OJ L 58,

28.2.2001).

(2001/C 318 E/030)

WRITTEN QUESTION E-0258/01

by Lord Inglewood (PPE-DE) to the Commission

(8 February 2001)

Subject: Right of Resale

What measures does the Commission intend to take to ensure a (cid:145)standard level of protection(cid:146) for the
purposes of the draft Directive on the Right of Resale to ensure that they are in conformity with the
provisions of Article 5 of the Treaty establishing the European Community in the implementation of the
draft Directive by the Member States, with particular regard to tax treatment?

Answer given by Mr Bolkestein on behalf of the Commission

(3 April 2001)

The Honourable Member is concerned about the possible effects on the internal market of certain aspects
of the resale right left unharmonised under the Proposal for a European Parliament and Council Directive
on the resale right for the benefit of the author of an original work of art (1).

The aim of this proposal is to set up a harmonised legal framework on the right of resale to ensure the
smooth running of
in modern and contemporary works of art within the European
Community.

the market

In order to meet its obligations under Article 5 of the EC Treaty, the Commission has taken care in its
proposal to limit the planned harmonisation to cover simply the disparities in legislation which distort the
running of the internal market, and to prevent the emergence of new disparities which could have the
same effect. In the explanatory memorandum to this proposal, the Commission justifies its choices from
a legal and economic standpoint. The Council took up and expanded this line of reasoning in its Common
Position of 19 June 2000 (2).

In Article 11 of its Common Position, the Council provides for the establishment of a Contact Committee,
in particular, to organise consultations on all questions deriving from the application of this Directive.