Raw tobacco: common organisation of the market COM

In adopting the report by Mr Raul Miguel ROSADO FERNANDES (UPE, P) by 216 votes to 131 with 6 abstentions, the European Parliament declared that the preservation of jobs must be regarded as the basic premise and requirement for any measures envisaged under the new rules. It rejected the idea that the price of tobacco in the Community was extremely low due to its poor quality, and called for an inter-professional institution to be set up to monitor quality and settle classification disputes. - Aids: Parliament called for effective support for producers' groups and for funding to be provided for part of their running costs. The proposed modulation of aid in relation to product quality should be determined, in each producing country, at a rate which should reach 40% within a period of no more than five years, - Premiums: Parliament opposed the reduction of premiums, which would have an adverse impact on growers' incomes, leading to the abandonment of many holdings. It called for premiums for producers in northern Europe to be reduced to pre-1993 reform levels; - Quotas: Parliament called for the quotas of farmers in the various producer Member States who wished to give up production to be taken up by producers' organizations and distributed to other, preferably young farmers in less-favoured regions. Parliament hoped that the Commission would distribute the quotas of farmers wishing to give up production to traditional regions and producers and to a national reserve which would be set up consisting of 5-6% of the Maximum Guaranteed Quantity of each Member State to enable production rights to be granted to young farmers. It called for provision to be made for production rights to be transferred from one group of varieties to another within the same marketing period, and for production rights to be transferred from one producers' group to another within the same marketing period provided there was no change as regards the group of varieties. It believed that the scheme whereby the Commission bought back production quotas from farmers who intended to abandon production must be applied only with the approval of the Member State concerned; - Supervision: Parliament called on the Commission to provide guarantees that tobacco-producing countries would be required to set up the supervisory agencies rapidly; otherwise, payments to these States would be affected immediately. It called for a thorough study of the scope for tobacco-producers to switch to alternative crops or activities which would bring in equivalent income; - Research: Parliament called on the Commission to provide information about the activities of the Tobacco Research and Information Fund before there was any increase in the resources made available to it. Parliament called for financial aid to be granted to carry out research and experiments with the aim of obtaining tobacco varieties containing low levels of nicotine, heavy metals and tars. Lastly, Parliament called on the Commission to provide technical assistance and pay compensatory aid to growers who helped to preserve the environment. �