Resolution on the Commission's work programme for the year 1999

PURPOSE: to present the Commission's work programme for 1999. CONTENT: in the light of the fundamental challenges faced by the European Union - namely, globalisation, international instability, technological and demographic changes, sustainable development, citizen's expectations of effective responses, subsidiarity, and proportionality, the Commission outlines the following main priorities for 1999: - the adoption of Agenda 2000 in the spring, to allow a smooth continuation of efforts at economic and social cohesion, define the new financial framework, improve internal and external agricultural competitiveness, and allow preparation for enlargement. - implementing the Treaty of Amsterdam as soon as it is ratified, hence opening up new possibilities for EU action in the areas of freedom, security and justice, sustainable development, employment and social policy, health, and the common foreign and security policy. - carrying forward the debate on institutional reform. - ensuring the success of the euro, and creating the preconditions for sustainable growth and employment, through continued work on operation of the single market, competition policy, Trans-european networks and transport policy, research, innovation and information society, SMEs and fisheries, all backed by better coordination of tax policies. - promoting a strong Europe open to the world, by promoting cooperation with the Mediterranean countries and support for the Middle-East peace process, providing assistance with reforms and economic recovery to the New Independent States, continuing efforts to achieve stability in the Balkans, implementing the transatlantic economic partnership established by the London EU-US summit of May 1998, promoting trade cooperation with Latin America and economic open-ness with Asia, preparing for the new WTO round in 2000, while also maintaining development policy, and ensuring greater coherence in the EU's human rights policy. - Finally, modernising the Commission's own structures - ie. ensuring that the Commission's activities are always in line with its policy priorities and adapting the organisational structures accordingly, decentralising, assigning responsibility, monitoring matters more closely and simplifying internal management. The Commission undertakes to make efforts to achieve a better concentration of the Community's limited resources, to pursue the policy of transparency enshrined in the Treaty of Amsterdam and create an independent, internal and external anti-fraud investigation structure.?