Management of expenditure relating to the food chain, animal health, animal welfare, plant health and plant reproductive material, 2014-2020

The Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development adopted the report by Agnès LE BRUN (EPP, FR) on the proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council laying down provisions for the management of expenditure relating to the food chain, animal health and animal welfare, and relating to plant health and plant reproductive material, amending Council Directives 98/56/EC, 2000/29/EC and 2008/90/EC, Regulations (EC) No 178/2002, (EC) No 882/2004 and (EC) No 396/2005, Directive 2009/128/EC and Regulation (EC) No 1107/2009 and repealing Council Decisions 66/399/EEC, 76/894/EEC and 2009/470/EC.

The committee recommended that Parliament’s position adopted at first reading following the ordinary legislative procedure should amend the Commission proposal as follows:

Budget and initial amount of grants: the Commission proposal provided an overall financial envelope of EUR 1 891, 936 million in current prices for the period from 1 January 2014 to 31 December 2020.

For cost-effectiveness reasons the Commission proposal suggests setting a threshold of EUR 50 000, below which no grants would be awarded. Members suggested deleting this threshold.

Access to the crisis reserve: Members deleted Article 5 of the Commission proposal that provides for access to be granted to the agricultural crisis reserve in order to respond to emergency situations in the veterinary or plant health sector.

Maximum rates grants: according to the report:

• the maximum rate may be increased to 75% of the eligible costs for collective action on plant or animal health for the control, prevention or eradication of pests or animal diseases, carried out by legally-constituted groups of operators or professional organisations comprising persons under public or private law, but excluding pet owners orveterinarians;
• the maximum rate may be increased to 100% of the eligible costs where the activities concern the prevention and control along the whole food chain of serious human, animal and plant health risks for the Union, based on the criteria referred to in the Regulation and, where appropriate; on an opinion delivered by EFSA.

The Commission should be empowered to adopt delegated acts laying down the criteria to be used to determine what constitutes a serious human, animal or plant health risk for the Union exists.

Lists of animal diseases and zoonoses: the Commission proposed drawing up the list of animal diseases and zoonoses which qualify for a grant by means of an implementing act. Members considered that the list of diseases is an essential element which should be incorporated into the basic act (in an annex). Furthermore, the possibility should be provided to supplement the list of diseases which qualify for a grant, without the procedure being as demanding as for a basic legal act, hence the use of delegated acts.

Eligible costs: Members proposed to include costs such as those relating to : (i) compensation to owners for the value of their animals slaughtered or culled, within the limit of the normal market value of the animals immediately before any suspicion or confirmation of the disease; (ii) losses due to emergency vaccination campaigns; (iii) the implementation of enhanced biosecurity measures as part of collective action; (iv) the transportation and destroying the contaminated feeding stuffs; (v) the transportation, processing and disposal of carcasses; (vi) the destruction of products of plant origin, within the limit of the value of those plants immediately before their destruction.

Criteria and objectives of actions: the Commission proposes that the objectives pursued and the criteria used to evaluate the national programmes should be set by means of their work programme. However, these objectives and criteria should be established in a more transparent way, using delegated acts.