Cucumber compensation cock-up

 

Spanish farmers look likely to suffer further losses following on from the Millions of Euros worth of produce that had to be destroyed following the E.Coli scare earlier on this year.

The German authorities unjustly blamed Spanish cucumbers for being the source of a particularly toxic strain of E.coli which resulted in a number of deaths throughout Europe.

The Bacteria caused haemolytic uremic syndrome - which attacks the kidneys and can cause seizures, strokes and comas. Under normal circumstances this would effect just a few people every year, however by the beginning of June Germany's national health agency reported that 1,534 people in the country had been infected by EHEC, a particularly deadly strain of the common bacteria found in the digestive systems of cows, humans and other mammals.

Once European Health authorities had been able to confirm that the strain did not originate from Spanish produce, the decision was made to compensate farmers for the produce that they had been forced to destroy and the damage that it had caused to their businesses and the overall image of the industry.

The EU set aside 227 Million Euros to compensate member states effected by the so-called "Cucumber Crisis", of which 79% has already been out.

71 Million of the total sum had been earmarked to compensate Spanish farmers, with 66% of this sum - 47 Million Euros - having been paid out to the effected producers already.

However, the EU set a deadline for distributing the money to the farmers of 15th October, and as such as penalties will be awarded for any payments not made by that date. The penalty will be made in the form of a reduction in the value of the compensation, starting from a 5% reduction after the 15th October and rising on the 15th of every month to a 50% reduction in January.

The European Commission is enforcing this ruling to ensure that the funds are not used by the member states that they are awarded to for any other purpose, and to avoid the temptation of using a variety of excuses to delay payments in order to spend the much needed funds elsewhere.

Once again, it looks like administrative inefficiency may result in financial loss for those who need it the most.