Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance

Aquaculture and the fish-processing industry should benefit from the financial instrument for fisheries guidance.

The proposal also makes provision to increase certain financial contributions under the Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance.

The future fund is even more specific about the role of women in fisheries than the current Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance.

I support the idea of making the current Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance more flexible and the derogation measures put forward in this proposal.

The Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance should include specific, targeted, fast credit facilities, or aquaculture will remain an option only for the well-off.

The funding in question can be secured by removing part of the Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance from the appropriations allocated to each Member State.

You may know that with effect from 15 January 2000, under the new financial instrument for fisheries guidance, Member States may encourage eradication of diseases in aquaculture.

Financial assistance is foreseen through the reallocation of funds including reprogramming the Spanish share (around EUR 30 million) of the Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance.

Finally, in the present programming period, under the Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance, Member States can co-finance studies and innovative projects covering the specific situation of women shellfish gatherers.

First and foremost, of course, the Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance, which can be used to apply for Community grants for the fleets and the fishermen and shipowners affected.

But it does not even represent 1% of the whole budget, and is funded by the Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance (FIFG), the regional fund and the social fund.

Returning to the Commission proposal, the sudden redirection of funds from the Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance (FIFG), raises serious doubts at the legal, financial and budgetary levels.

Mr President, Commissioners, ladies and gentlemen, in 1994 fisheries became a part of the Structural Funds for the first time and the financial instrument for fisheries guidance (FIFG) was set up.

Until 31 December 1999 the Structural Funds, the financial instrument for fisheries guidance and the European Investment Bank will each continue to make their respective contribution to achieving a priority objective, which is called Objective 6.

This proposal for a Council regulation will contain a series of derogations from the provisions of the Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance and will propose specific measures for which additional funds will be earmarked.

Accordingly, I feel that the derogations currently applying to the outermost regions, as enshrined in the Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance (FIFG), must remain in the new text of the European Fisheries Fund.

Lastly, with regard to the proposal for a regulation on the Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance (FIFG), the special rates for fleet renewal and modernisation measures must be applied to ships of up to 16 metres in length.

Firstly, to reincorporate the appropriations unjustifiably cut by the Council from the draft preliminary budget presented by the Commission in relation to two important issues: international fisheries agreements in relation to cuts of payments from the financial instrument for fisheries guidance.

Measures must therefore be taken to facilitate the conversion of these vessels, for example by exempting them from having to pay back construction or modernisation aid obtained during the previous ten years, and temporary tie-up aid awarded under the Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance.

In this regard under the European Fisheries Fund, we are considering more incentives for young fishers, in addition to the measures already foreseen under the Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance such as training, including training on health and safety, and the upgrading of professional skills.

I also regret that the financing for the European Fisheries Fund (EFF), in a Union with 27 members, does not differ significantly from the budget of the FIFG (Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance) in a Union with 15 members.

Examples of this include the projected reductions in the European Agricultural Guidance and Guarantee Fund, the Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance - Community programmes from the previous Community framework, 2002-2006 - or LIFE+, the Financial Instrument for the Environment.

The Commission should therefore maintain, in the European Fisheries Fund, the level of aid currently granted under the Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance, the level of aid for the processing industry and the derogations that have thus far enabled the outermost regions to modernise their fleet.

No transitional measures to mitigate the effects of the ban have been planned, but I would encourage Member States to make full use of the possibilities that are already available for the temporary cessation of activities under the Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance to help those most severely affected.

For example, does it intend to put forward proposals to allow measures to be taken under the existing Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance, or under the future European Fisheries Fund, or under any other mechanism, to improve the economic situation and to thus preserve the future of regions which have no real alternative?