EU Probably in Blair Compliance

USDA believes it is "likely" the European Union did not exceed Blair House agreement limits for the production of oilseeds in 2001-02. The EU did not exceed those limits last season either. Agenda 2000 changes to the EU's Common Agricultural Policy are reducing oilseed support levels thereby reducing incentives to plant oilseeds.

The European Commission normally produces data related to compliance with the Blair House agreement early in the next calendar year following the harvest of an oilseed crop. Consequently, final data will likely not be available for the 2001-02 crop until sometime after Jan. 1. Nonetheless, it appears that the European Union will not exceed its adjusted maximum guaranteed area (MGA) and 1 million ton limits with the the latest oilseed crop, according to a Foreign Agricultural Service report.

October USDA estimates for rapeseed, sunflower and soybean area total 5.44 million hectares, up slightly from last year but fewer than the 5.89 million hectares in 1998, the last year the EU exceeded the adjusted MGA limit. COCERAL, the oilseed crushers representative organization to the European Commission, estimates area of non-food oilseeds at 770,000 hectares.

"This suggests that EU oilseed area for food use was in the neighborhood of 4.67 million hectares (5.44 - 0.77 = 4.67), less than the adjusted MGA limit of 4.94 million hectares" reports USDA. "If this is true, the EU will not be required to reduce compensatory payments to oilseed producers for the 2001-02 crop as would be required if the limit were exceded." For 2000-01, the European Union was 518,000 hectares below the adjusted MGA Blair House limit according to data released by the European Commission. Italy, France, and Luxembourg were over their individual adjusted MGA's, but Denmark, Spain, Germany and other EU countries were sufficiently below their adjusted MGA's to compensate.

The full report is available on the FAS web site at EU Likely Remains in Compliance With Oilseeds Production Limits