CELEX: 31978R0978
Language: en
Date: 1978-05-10 00:00:00
Title: Council Regulation (EEC) No 978/78 of 10 May 1978 on statistical surveys of areas under vines

17. 5. 78                          Official Journal of the European Communities                            No L 128/ 1
                                                            I
                                         (Acts whose publication is obligatory)
                                    COUNCIL REGULATION (EEC) No 978/78
                                                    of 10 May 1978
                                     on statistical surveys of areas under vines
THE COUNCIL OF THE EUROPEAN                                    Whereas a land register in the strict sense involves
COMMUNITIES,                                                   major administrative work on the establishment,
                                                               processing and constant updating of a list or register
Having regard to the Treaty establishing the European          containing information on the owners and on all
 Economic Community, and in particular Article 43              parcels of land under vines with sufficient details for
thereof,                                                       their identification ; whereas viticultural land registers
                                                               in this sense have been established only by some
 Having regard to the proposal from the Commission,            Member States, which have moreover been able to
                                                               update them only partially and at irregular intervals ;
 Having regard to the opinion of the European Parlia­          whereas the surveys on the areas under vines carried
 ment (1),                                                     out by certain Member States have different reference
                                                               years ; whereas these national land registers and
 Having regard to the opinion of the Economic and              surveys do not therefore permit precise uniform
Social Committee (2),                                          synchronized observation of production potential and
                                                               supply on the Community vine markets ;
Whereas the Commission, in order to fulfil its obliga­
tions under the Treaty and the Community provisions
on the common organization of the market in wine,
requires accurate up-to-date data on the production            Whereas, in order to assess the Community wine
potential of the areas under vines in the Community            market situation and developments therein, every 10
and on medium-term trends in production and                    years basic statistical surveys covering the total areas
supply ;                                                       under vines should be conducted in vinegrowing hold­
                                                               ings and, in between the basic surveys, smaller statis­
Whereas Article 1 of Regulation No 24 on the progres­          tical surveys should be conducted only on the area
sive establishment of a common organization of the             under vines of wine grape varieties ;
 market in wine (3), as last amended by the Act of
Accession (4), provides that Member States shall, not
later than 31 December 1964, prepare a viticultural
land register which shall thereafter be kept up to             Whereas, for economic and technical reasons and in
date ;                                                         view of their limited significance on the Community
                                                               wine market, vines cultivated in the open air in
                                                               Member States with a total area under vines of less
Whereas Commission Regulation No 26/64/EEC of
28 February 1964 laying down additional provisions             than 500 hectares, vines cultivated under glass and
for the preparation of the viticultural land register, for     vines produced on very small areas solely for home
its management and for keeping it up to date (5), as           consumption by the growers should all be excluded
last amended by Regulation (EEC) No 1456/76 (6),               from the surveys ;
provides that the complete revision of the Community
viticultural land register referred to in Article 3 ( 1 ),
should take place every 10 years, beginning in 1979 ;
                                                               Whereas detailed information is necessary on the use
(>) OJ No C 108, 8. 5. 1978, p. 62.                            of the area under vines for the production of wine
(2) Opinion delivered on 29 March 1978 (not yet published      grapes, table grapes and material for vegetative propa­
    in the Official Journal).                                  gation of vines, as well as on the varieties and the age
(3) OJ No 30, 20. 4. 1962, p. 989/62.
(4) OJ No L 73, 27. 3. 1972, p. 14.                            of the vines ; whereas the overproduction of table
(5) OJ No 48, 19. 3. 1964, p. 753/64.                          wine in particular can create serious difficulties in the
(6) OJ No L 163, 24. 6. 1976, p. 13.                           wine economies of certain producer countries ;
 ---pagebreak---  No L 128 /2                        Official Journal of the European Communities                                17 . 5 . 78
whereas it is therefore necessary to record separately         whereas such adjustment can considerably reduce the
 the area under vines intended for the production of           ever-increasing costs of managing the wine market ;
quality wines psr and of table wines ;                         whereas the Community should therefore be made
                                                               financially responsible with regard to the expenses
                                                               incurred by the Member States concerned in connec­
Whereas, in order to keep the development of wine              tion with the first basic survey under this Regulation ;
 production potential under constant observation, there
 should be annual intermediate surveys of any changes
 by way of grubbing, new planting or replanting in the         Whereas the establishment of the survey system under
 area under vines of wine grape varieties ;                    this Regulation requires the consequent amendment
                                                               of certain Community provisions in the wine sector,
Whereas the results of both the basic and the inter­
 mediate surveys should be forwarded to the Commis­
sion as quickly as possible ;                                  HAS ADOPTED THIS REGULATION :
Whereas consideration should also be given to statis­
 tics resulting from the application of other Commu­                                    Article 1
 nity provisions laying down measures for re­
organizing Community wine production ;
                                                               1 . Member States on whose territory the total area
                                                               of vines cultivated in the open air is not less than 500
Whereas, since sample survey methods can produce               hectares shall carry out :
accurate results at moderate cost over large areas
under vines, Member States should be allowed to               — every 10 years basic surveys on the area under
conduct the surveys either exhaustively or by sample,              vines ; the first basic survey shall be carried out in
provided that standards of statistical reliability are laid         1979, or before 1 April 1980 at the latest, and shall
down ;                                                             relate to the situation after grubbing and planting
                                                                   in the 1978/79 wine-growing year,
Whereas, in order to be able to assess the production          — annually from the second year after the basic
of wine in the Community, information is required                  surveys, intermediate surveys on the changes
each year on yields per hectare and on the mean                    taking place in the areas under vines of wine grape
natural alcoholic strength of fresh grapes, of grape               varieties ; the first intermediate survey shall be
 must and of wine ; whereas, in view of the existence of           carried out in 1981 and shall relate to changes
areas with widely differing yields, the area under vines           during the two wine-growing years 1979/80 and
of wine grape varieties should be subdivided into yield             1980/81 .
classes ;
                                                               2. The wine-growing year shall be that fixed on the
Whereas the Commission must submit reports in                 basis of Article 5 of Regulation No 24.
order to enable the Council to examine the extent to
which the surveys carried out and the information
communicated can help achieve the objectives of this                                    Article 2
Regulation ; whereas, where appropriate, it must
propose the harmonization of the methods used ;                1 . The basic surveys shall cover all holdings having
                                                              a cultivated area under vines normally intended for
Whereas Member States and the Commission must                 the production for sale of grapes, grape must, wine or
cooperate as fully as possible when applying this Regu­       vegetative propagation material for vines.
lation ; whereas the implementing rules must be laid
down after consultation with the Standing Committee           2. During the basic surveys, the following particu­
for Agricultural Statistics, set up by Decision               lars shall be recorded for each holding referred to in
72/279/EEC (») ;                                              paragraph 1 :
Whereas the procedure to be followed by the Standing          A. Agricultural area in use ;
Committee for Agricultural Statistics must be laid
down ;                                                         B. Area under vines cultivated.
                                                                   The area under vines cultivated is to be broken
Whereas statistical surveys allow production potential             down according to its normal production use into :
to be adjusted to market demand in good time ;
                                                                   (a) the area under wine grape varieties, further
(») OJ No L 179, 7. 8. 1972, p. 1 .                                    broken down into :
 ---pagebreak---  17. 5. 78                           Official Journal of the European Communities                            No L 128/3
         — quality wines psr,                                  2.     The Member States concerned shall take suitable
         — other wines,                                        measures to limit and, where necessary, to estimate
                                                               errors of observation for the total area under vines
             — including wine compulsorily intended
                 for the manufacture of certain potable        cultivated for each type of production use referred to
                 spirits obtained from wine with a regis­      in Article 2 (2) (B).
                 tered designation of origin ;                 3.     The basic surveys may either be exhaustive or
     (b) the area under table grape varieties ;                based on random sampling. As regards the results of
                                                               the basic surveys carried out by random sampling, the
     (c) the area planted with root-stock for future           Member States shall take all the necessary measures to
         grafting ;                                            ensure that the sampling error at the 68 % confidence
                                                               level shall be of the order of 1 % at most for the
     (d) the area cultivated solely for the production of      survey particulars referred to in Article 2 (2) (B) within
         vegetative propagation material for vines subdi­      the geographical units concerned. The samples shall
         vided into :
                                                               include holdings of all sizes.
         — nurseries,
         — parent vines for root-stock.                                                  Article 4
     Varieties which are classified simultaneously as           1 . The Member States concerned shall notify the
     wine grape varieties and table grape varieties shall      Commission of the results of the basic surveys as soon
     be recorded according to their predominant use in         as possible but not later than 15 months after comple­
     the geographical units concerned.                         tion of the field work.
3. During the basic surveys, the following particu­            2. The results of the basic surveys shall be
lars shall be recorded for the area under wine grape           submitted by geographical unit in the form of a sche­
varieties :                                                    dule of tables to be adopted in accordance with the
A. Vine varieties                                              procedure laid down in Article 8 .
     In the Member States concerned, a separate record         3. The geographical units referred to in paragraph
     shall be made for each geographical unit referred         2, in Article 2 (2) (B) and (3) (A) and in Article 3 (3)
     to in Article 4 (3) of those vine varieties which         shall be as follows :
     together constitute at least 70 % of the total area       — in the Federal Republic of Germany : the wine­
     under wine grape varieties, and, in any case, of               growing regions defined in accordance with
     those varieties which constitute 3 % or more of
                                                                    Article 2 of Council Regulation (EEC) No 817/70
     the said area. The remaining varieties may be                  of 28 April 1970 laying down special provisions
    grouped together according to the colour of the                 relating to quality wines produced in specified
    grapes ;                                                        regions (1), as last amended by Regulation (EEC)
B. Age of the vines                                                 No 2211 /77 (2),
                                                               — in France : the departments or groups of depart­
    The age of the vines shall be calculated from the               ments listed in the Annex hereto,
    wine-growing year in which they were planted or
    grafted. The age groups shall be established for           — in Italy : the provinces,
     each Member State concerned in accordance with            — in     the other Member States concerned : their
     the procedure laid down in Article 8 .                         entire national territory.
4. This Regulation shall not affect any provisions in          4. Member States which process their basic survey
the Member States providing for surveys of the areas           results electronically shall submit these results in a
under vines which include, together with the informa­          machine-readable form, to be determined in accor­
tion referred to in paragraphs 2 and 3, additional infor­      dance with the procedure laid down in Article 8 .
mation obtained, for example, as a result of a wider
field of enquiry than that referred to in paragraph 1 or                                 Article 5
from a more detailed specification of the particulars of
the areas under vines and the holdings concerned.               1.    The intermediate surveys shall cover the area
Such additional results must also be forwarded to the          under vines of wine grape varieties in the holdings
Commission .                                                   referred to in Article 2 ( 1 ) and shall relate to changes
                                                               which have taken place in that area during the
                          Article 3                            preceding wine-growing year ; however, the first inter­
                                                               mediate surveys following the basic surveys shall relate
1.     The Member States concerned shall submit to             to the changes during the previous two wine-growing
the Commission before 30 September of the                      years.
preceding year a detailed description of the methods
to be used for the basic surveys and, where appro­             (•) OJ No L 99, 5. 5. 1970, p. 20.
priate, of the sampling plan.                                  (2) OJ No L 256, 7. 10. 1977, p. 1 .
 ---pagebreak--- No L 128/4                        Official Journal of the European Communities                              17. 5. 78
2.    During the intermediate surveys the areas under       vines of wine grape varieties, broken down into the
wines which                                                 yield classes referred to in paragraph 2.
— have been grubbed or are no longer cultivated,            2.    The Member States concerned shall subdivide
— have been planted or replanted,                           the areas under the vines cultivated with wine grape
                                                            varieties as recorded in the basic surveys into yield
shall be recorded for the areas normally used for the       classes based upon the mean yield per hectare referred
production of :                                             to in paragraph 1 and established in accordance with
                                                            the procedure laid down in Article 8 .
— quality wines psr,
— other wines,                                              3.     The Member States concerned shall estimate the
    — including wines compulsorily intended for the         future trends over five wine-growing years in average
        manufacture of certain potable spirits obtained     yields per hectare for each yield class referred to in
        from wine with a registered designation of          paragraph 2, taking into account agronomic and
        origin,                                             economic developments.
by the vine variety or at least by the yield classes        4. The information referred to in paragraphs 1 , 2
referred to in Article 6 (2). Any figures relating to the   and 3 shall be broken down by the geographical units
grubbing and planting of vines obtained as a result of      referred to in Article 4 (3), distinguishing between the
the implementation of other Community provisions            areas under vines of varieties normally intended for
shall be taken into consideration .                         the production of :
                                                            — quality wines psr,
3. The intermediate surveys may be either exhaus­
tive or based on random sampling. As regards the            — other wines,
results of the intermediate surveys carried out by               — including wines compulsory intended for the
random sampling, the Member States concerned shall                  manufacture of certain potable spirits obtained
take all necessary measures to ensure that the                      from wine with a registered designation of
sampling error at the 68 % confidence level shall be                origin.
of the order of 3 % at most for the whole of the culti­
vated area under vines normally intended for the             5.    The Member States concerned shall communi­
production of wine grapes in the geographical units         cate to the Commission, for each wine-growing year
concerned.                                                  and broken down by geographical units, estimates of
                                                             the mean natural alcoholic strength expressed as a
4.    The Member States concerned shall submit to
                                                             percentage of the volume or in °Oechsle of the fresh
the Commission before 30 June 1980 a detailed               grapes, grape musts or wines, produced from the
description of the methods to be used for the inter­         1979/80 wine-growing year onwards in the areas
mediate surveys ; advance notice shall be given of any      under vines of wine grape varieties normally intended
change in such methods.                                      for the production of :
5.    The Member States concerned shall submit the          — quality wines psr,
results of the intermediate surveys to the Commission       — other wines,
before 1 May of the year following the wine-growing
years concerned. They shall be broken down into the              — including wines compulsorily intended for the
geographical units set out in Article 4 (3) in the form              manufacture of certain potable spirits obtained
of a schedule of tables to be adopted in accordance                 from wine with a registered designation of
with the procedure laid down in Article 8 .                         origin.
6. Member States which process their intermediate            6. The annual information referred to in para­
survey results electronically shall submit the results      graphs 1 and 5 shall be communicated before 1 April
referred to in paragraph 5 in a machine-readable form,       following each wine-growing year. The information
to be determined in accordance with the procedure           on the yield classes referred to in paragraph 2 shall be
laid down in Article 8 .                                    submitted within the period laid down in Article 4 ( 1 ).
                                                            The estimates of future trends in average yields per
                                                             hectare referred to in paragraph 3 shall be submitted :
                        Article 6
                                                            — for the first time, before 1 October 1981 ,
1.    The Member States concerned shall submit to           — thereafter, every five years before 1 April.
the Commission for each wine-growing year the mean
yield per hectare in terms of hectolitres per hectare of     7.    The information referred to in this Article shall
grape must or wine or in terms of decitonnes per             be forwarded to the Commission in the form of a sche­
hectare of grapes produced, with effect from the            dule of tables to be adopted in accordance with proce­
1979/80 wine-growing year, from the areas under              dure laid down in Article 8 .
 ---pagebreak--- 17. 5. 78                           Official Journal of the European Communities                             No L 128 /5
                         Article 7                                      the absence of any     opinion, the Commission
                                                                        shall without delay     submit to the Council a
1 . The Commission shall study in consultation and
                                                                        proposal concerning     the measures to be taken.
                                                                        The Council shall         decide by a qualified
continuing collaboration with the Member States :
                                                                        majority.
(a) the results supplied ;                                         (c) If no decision has been taken by the Council
(b) the technical problems raised by the surveys and                    three months after a proposal has been
     the collection of information to be communicated,                  submitted to it, the proposed measures shall be
     with particular reference to the Community defini­                 adopted by the Commission.
     tions relating to plantings/re-plantings and the
     definition relating to cessation of wine-growing ;
                                                                                         Article 9
(c) the significance of the findings of the surveys and
     the information communicated.
                                                              The necessary expenditure for the basic survey on the
                                                               situation after the 1978/79 wine-growing year shall be
2.     The Commission shall submit to the Council,             covered up to a lump sum to be determined in the
within one year of communication of the results by             budget of the European Communities.
the Member States concerned, these results together
with a report on experience acquired during the basic
surveys.                                                                                Article 10
3. The Commission shall publish the results of the             1.      Article 1 of Regulation No 24 is hereby
intermediate surveys and the annual information                amended to read as follows :
referred to in Article 6 as part of the annual reports
provided for in Article 17 (4) of Council Regulation                Article 1
(EEC) No 816/70 of 28 April 1970 laying down addi­
tional provisions for the common organization of the                Member States shall keep a check by annual
market in wine (1), as last amended by Regulation                   surveys on areas for the production of vegetative
(EEC) No 2560/77 (2).                                               propagation material for vines.'.
                                                               2. Article 3 ( 1 ) of Council Regulation (EEC) No
                         Article 8                             1388/70 of 13 July 1970 on general rules for the classi­
                                                               fication of vine varieties (3), as last amended by Regula­
                                                               tion (EEC) No 418/74 (4), is hereby replaced by the
 1.    Where the procedure laid down in this Article is        following text :
to be followed, the Chairman shall refer the matter to
the Standing Committee for Agricultural Statistics,                  Article 3
hereinafter called the 'Committee', either on his own
initiative or at the request of the representative of a             1 . Wine grape varieties and table grape varieties
Member State.
                                                                    shall be classified for each of the following admi­
                                                                    nistrative units or parts thereof :
2.     The Commission representative shall submit to
the Committee a draft of the measures to be taken .                 — the Regierungsbezirk in the Federal Republic
The Committee shall give its opinion on this draft                       of Germany,
within a time limit that may be set by the Chairman                 — the department in France,
in accordance with the urgency of the matter. It shall
act by a majority of 41 votes, the votes of Member                  — the province in Italy,
States being weighted as laid down in Article 148 (2)               — the entire national territory in the other
of the Treaty. The Chairman shall not vote.                              Member States.'
3. (a) The Commission shall adopt the proposed
         measures when they are in accordance with the                                  Article 11
        opinion of the Committee.
                                                               This Regulation shall enter into force on the third day
    (b) When the proposed measures are not in accor­           following its publication in the Official Journal of
        dance with the opinion of the Committee, or in         the European Communities.
(') OJ No L 99, 5. 5. 1970, p. 1 .                            (3) OJ No L 153, 16. 7. 1970, p. 5.
0 OJ No L 303, 28 . 11 . 1977, p. 1 .                         (4) OJ No L 49, 21 . 2. 1974, p. 1 .
 ---pagebreak--- No L 128/6                          Official Journal of the European Communities                               17. 5. 78
           This Regulation shall be binding in its entirety and directly applicable in all Member
           States.
           Done at Brussels, 10 May 1978 .
                                                                           For the Council
                                                                              The President
                                                                             P. DALSAGER
                                                        ANNEX
                     List of departments or groups of departments referred to in Article 4 (3)
           FRANCE
             1 . Aude                                         18 . Côte-dOr, Nièvre, Saône-et-Loire, Yonne
             2. Gard                                          19. Meurthe-et-Moselle,      Meuse,     Moselle,
             3 . Hérault                                           Vosges
                                                              20 . Bas-Rhin , Haut-Rhin
            4 . Lozère
                                                              21 . Doubs, Jura, Haute-Saone, Territoire de
             5. Pyrénées-Orientales                                Belfort
             6 . Var
                                                              22. Loire-Atlantique, Maine-et-Loire, Sarthe,
             7 . Vaucluse                                          Vendée
             8 . Bouches-du-Rhône                             23 . Deux-Sevres, Vienne
             9 . Gironde                                      24. Dordogne,        Landes,    Lot-et-Garonne,
           10 . Gers                                               Pyrénées-Atlantiques
           1 1 . Charente                                     25. Ariège, Aveyron, Haute-Garonne, Lot,
                                                                   Hautes-Pyrénées, Tarn, Tarn-et-Garonne
           12 . Charente-Maritime
                                                              26. Correze, Haute-Vienne
           13 . Ardèche
                                                              27. Ain, Drome, Isère, Loire, Rhone, Savoie,
           14 . Aisne                                              Haute-Savoie
           15 . Seine-et-Marne                                28 . Cantal, Allier, Haute-Loire, Puy-de-Dôme
           16 . Ardennes, Aube, Marne, Haute-Marne            29. Alpes-de-Haute-Provence,
           17. Cher, Eure-et-Loir, Indre, Indre-et-Loir,           Alpes-Maritimes
                 Loir-et-Cher, Loiret                         30 . Corse-de-Sud, Haute-Corse