Olive and olive oil sector: reform of the common organisation of the market COM

In adopting the report by Mr Salvador JOVE PERES (GUE/NGL, E) Parliament rejected the only option put forward by the Commission for the reform of the COM for olives and olive oil, namely aid per tree. This move would entail risks to the environment, a risk of rural depopulation and could lead to speculative planting and it did not take account of two fundamental objectives: the quality and stability of the markets. Parliament therefore called on the Commission to submit legislative proposals for a reform of the COM based on the following aspects: - the granting of a single form of production aid: this would have the advantage of guaranteeing a fair income for all producers on the basis of the quantity of oil actually produced (inclusion of small producers in the general production aid scheme, improved controls, creation of an additional system of aid to small farms); - increasing the maximum guaranteed quantity to bring it into line with total Community consumption, average annual exports and a margin for security; - establishing national reference quantities (NRQs) for the producer Member States; - final abolition of the consumption aid and the application of an integrated control system from production to consumption; - maintaining the intervention mechanism and the intervention price, with measures for private storage and the establishment of buffer stocks; - the implementation and financing of a global policy for the promotion of consumption and quality; - the overall simplification of the system with a view to achieving the increased transparency needed for combating fraud in the sector. Parliament urged that olive cultivation registers should be drawn up in the Member States which did not have them as yet. With regard to Agenda 2000, Parliament stressed the discriminatory treatment applied to Mediterranean crops and noted that the imbalance in the distribution of financial aid between these products and continental products could get worse. It called on the Commission to draw up a general framework for possible variations in aid going beyond the olive oil sector. This framework should set out the different production methods and govern the relationship between aid and socio-economic, regional and environmental criteria. It also called on the Commission in its legislative proposals to make the necessary adjustments to take into account the links between agriculture and the economy as a whole. �