REPORT FROM THE COMMISSION TO THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND THE COUNCIL on the exercise of the power to adopt delegated acts conferred on the Commission under Regulation (EC) No 543/2009 concerning crop statistics
Date: 2018-01-12
Institutions: European Commission, Eurostat
Subjects: EU statistics, European Commission, agricultural production, agricultural statistics, crop production, data collection, delegated legislation, powers of the institutions (EU), transfer of competence

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  EN 

   EUROPEAN COMMISSION  Brussels, 12.1.2018  COM(2018) 13 final  REPORT FROM THE COMMISSION TO THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND THE COUNCIL on the exercise of the power to adopt delegated acts conferred on the Commission under Regulation (EC) No 543/2009 concerning  crop statistics   
 
 
1. 

BACKGROUND 

Regulation  (EC)  No  543/2009  of  18  June  2009  concerning  crop  statistics  and  repealing 
Council Regulations  (EEC)  No 837/90  and (EEC) No  959/931  was  modified  by Regulation 
(EU)  No  1350/2013  of  11  December  2013  amending  certain  legislative  acts  in  the  field  of 
agricultural  and  fishery  statistics2  to  align  implementing  powers  with  the  Treaty  on  the 
Functioning of the European Union. 

Article  8a of Regulation (EC) No 543/2009  confers  on the Commission  the power to adopt 
delegated  acts.  According  to  Article  6  of  Regulation  (EC)  No 543/2009  the  power  of 
delegation  can  be  used  to  amend  the  transmission  tables  set  out  in  the  Annex  to  the 
Regulation. 

Under  Article 8a(2)  of  the  Regulation,  the  power  to  adopt  delegated  acts  is  conferred  for  a 
period of five years from 10 January 2014. This power is to be tacitly extended for periods of 
five years unless the European Parliament or the Council object. 

The Commission is obliged to draw up a report on the delegation of power not later than nine 
months before the end of the five-year period. This report fulfils this obligation. 

2. 

COMMISSION  EXERCISE  OF  DELEGATED  POWERS  UNDER  REGULATION  (EC)  NO 
543/2009 

The  Commission  used  its  power  to  adopt  delegated  acts  to  adopt  Commission  Delegated 
Regulation (EU) 2015/1557 of 13 July 2015, amending Regulation (EC) No 543/2009 of the 
European Parliament and of the Council concerning crop statistics.3   

The Commission’s periodic review of the collection of crop statistics data demonstrated that 
the Annex to Regulation (EC) No 543/2009 need an update to improve the clarity of concepts 
and data quality and to better respond to user needs, which were changed by the 2014 reform 
of the common agricultural policy. Eurostat carried out the review in close co-operation with 
the Directorate-General for Agriculture and Rural Development and Member States. 

As  a  result, Commission  Delegated Regulation  (EU)  2015/1557  amending  Regulation  (EC) 
No  543/2009  concerning  crop  statistics  was  adopted,  updating  the  transmission  tables  of 
Regulation  (EC) No 543/2009.  The updates  concerned mostly clarifications of variable and 
aggregate names; some redundant aggregates were dropped from the transmission tables. 

The  update  of  the  Annex  to  Regulation  (EC)  No  543/2009  concerned  only  non-essential 
elements of that annex. The reduced number of aggregates and clear class names, hierarchy 
and composition of aggregates have improved the quality of data and reduced the number of 
errors linked to definitions. The data have become more comparable.   

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3  

OJ L 167, 29.6.2009, p. 1. 
OJ L 351, 21.12.2013, p. 1. 
OJ L 244, 19.9.2015, p. 11. 

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The impact on data collection and processing in Member States (both at the level of national 
statistical institutes and of respondents) was positive and relatively small. 

3. 

CONCLUSIONS 

The  Commission  has  exercised  its  delegated  powers.  It  considers  that  it  should  continue  to 
have these powers as in the future it may need to adopt a delegated act to again modify the 
transmission  tables  set  in  the  Annex  mentioned  in  Article  6  of  the  Regulation  to  meet  the 
needs of data users in the context of the future common agricultural policy. 

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