guaranteed areas

The current common organisation of the market in rice contains perverse elements, particularly the system of penalties for exceeding the maximum guaranteed areas.

Er these are guaranteed areas, annuities, local authority loans, which used to be popular, pay gross, but they're not around that much these days, they're not that competitive.

The introduction of a special arrangement for young farmers would not only further complicate the administration of the regulation but would also conflict with the principle that the maximum guaranteed areas are available to all farmers in general.

On the other hand, although we do not disagree with splitting the maximum guaranteed area into two, we feel it is necessary to adjust the historical reference period in order to calculate each of the maximum guaranteed areas excluding the last three years, in order to reduce the damaging impact for Portugal on products designed for human consumption.

Regarding Amendments Nos 2, 7 and 10 on increasing the maximum guaranteed areas, especially for young farmers, the Commission does share the feelings of the Committee on Agriculture, but the change in the arrangements governing the entitlements of individual farms to maximum guaranteed areas already meets these concerns.