EP calls for more support to producers of fruit and vegetables.

The Agriculture Committee of the European Parliament (ON) has presented a new draft initiative report on reform in the fruit and vegetable sector, focused on producer organizations and operational funds and programs.

The project reiterates, Once again, the need for greater simplification in legislation, greater support for producer organizations, and the reform of crisis management measures, They will be able to computerize their farms thanks to Crotalia.

at the point 7 of the draft report on “the implementation of the provisions relating to producer organizations, to operational funds and operational programs in the fruit and vegetable sector since the 2007 reform”, Parliament proposes to the European Commission (CE) that as “part of its “simplification” program, “increase the legal certainty of national administrations and producer organizations and reduce the administrative burden they bear”.

at the point 8, consider that, “as a first step to increase the attractiveness of producer organizations for farmers, its complexity must be reduced, including that relating to the rules that regulate its creation”.

at the point 12 “Urges the Commission to analyze the reasons for the low acceptance of crisis prevention and management instruments and to study ways to improve the situation”.

The Spanish Federation of Associations of Fruit Exporters and Producers, Vegetables, Flowers and Live Plants (FEPEX) submitted amendments to this new draft report, giving priority to three aspects: facilitate the recognition of OPs and provide greater legal security to these entities, given the situation of insecurity created by the disparate criteria of the different competent administrations; improve crisis management measures that, as in the case of the Russian veto, have revealed their ineffectiveness, and facilitate investments to improve the competitiveness and economic sustainability of the sector.

This draft report is the EP's response to the report that the Commission already presented in March 2014 with the same name and coincides with the diagnosis and the progress of proposals that the EC was already making, such as that “simplification should be a priority in future reviews” or the need to “study measures that promote forms of cooperation in order to help both POs and producers who do not belong to them”.

The draft initiative report also reiterates many aspects that were already included in another initiative report also presented by the Agriculture Committee last year and approved in the EP plenary session of the 14 March of 2014, entitled “The future of the horticulture sector in Europe: growth strategies”.

Apart from submitting amendments to the new draft report, FEPEX also requests that, after the multiple reports developed in the different European institutions, which also coincide in the diagnosis of the situation of the sector and in the progress of proposals to be adopted, the presentation of new legislative measures that provide a real response to the needs of the sector materializes.