ENVIRONMENT/AGRICULTURE: STATISTICS REQUIRED FOR ENVIRONMENTAL INDICATORS.

The January 2000 paper and the new Communication (COM(2001)144) form part of the European Commission's response to the European Council at Cardiff in June 1998 which invited all relevant formations of the Council to establish their own strategies for giving effect to environmental integration and sustainable development within their policy areas. The European Commission's papers will also form part of the package to be unveiled at the Gothenburg Summit in mid-June.The new document concentrates on the targets and indicators outlined in COM(2000)20 and on the necessary measures to be taken to acquire the necessary data. The Commission points out that, in November 1999, the Farm Council adopted a strategy aiming at integrating environmental concerns into the CAP by means of reforms introduced as part of Agenda 2000. Targets were set for water, agro-chemicals, air quality, the landscape and biodiversity. The Commission stresses in the new communication that political objectives now need to be set out and progress towards meeting those objectives needs to be measured. Appropriately-developed agri-environmental indicators will be particularly important, but in order to be meaningful, they must give a sufficiently accurate picture of the underlying...