Sighted by director Mr P. Diaz Munoz on 3.07.2013
Edited for EN - Tim Allen 4/7/2013 One comment - given that this will be issued after 1 July, it would be better if Croatia was included with the Member States in graphs and tables.
Reply from Garry Mahon, 8/7/2013: I would prefer to leave Croatia separate for the following reason. The SIF compares agricultural income for 2012 with that for 2011. In both these years, Croatia was not a Member State and not subject to the Common Agricultural Policy. This is why we present EU-27 and not EU-28, although we can calculate the latter. Since we present and discuss EU-27 figures, I feel it might be misleading if Croatia is listed amongst the Member States but not included in the aggregate. Consistency figures-tables checked on 8/7/2013 by Louise Corselli-Nordblad. The following comments (in bold):
Crop output
Ten Member States reported declines in total crop output in 2012 (see Table 4), which were most marked in Romania (-28.9 %), Slovakia (-11.0 %, Malta (-8.5%) and Slovenia (-7.9 %). The largest increases in the value of crop output were observed in Latvia and Luxembourg (+31.4 %), Estonia (+16.4 %), Lithuania (+15.1 %) and Belgium (+13.5 %).
Animal output
For animals (meat and livestock), the value in basic prices was up 5.5 %. Higher producer prices were the main reason for this in almost all animal groups: equines (+13.1 %), pigs (+9.7 %), cattle (+8.4 %) and poultry (+2.3 %). The only (slight) decrease in the price development was observed for sheep and goats (-1.0%). As regards volume, all categories (except poultry, +2.6 % and milk, +0.3 %) registered a drop compared with 2011: sheep and goats (-2.2 %); cattle (-2.1 %) and pigs (-1.8 %).
Value of intermediate consumption was higher in 2012 than 2011
The value of intermediate consumption rose in twenty-two EU Member States in 2012, compared with the previous year. The most marked increases were recorded in Latvia (+12.6 %), Luxembourg (+8.6 %) and Estonia (+8.0 %). Out of the five countries which reported a decrease in 2012, the steepest declines were observed in Romania (-17.4%), Slovakia (-5.6%) and Malta (-4.9%).
Agricultural labour input remained at the same level in 2012
In 2012, the agricultural labour input decreased slightly in thirteen Member States compared with the previous year; it remained almost stable in eight and increased in six. The steepest declines were seen in Slovakia (-5.7 %), Sweden (-4.7 %) Finland and the Netherlands (-3.3 %).
I could not check all the figures in the text, since not all of them were listed in the tables.
Reply from Garry Mahon, 10/07/2013: The figures in bold correspond to the latest update of the data, as they appear in Eurobase. The tables are thus correct and the text needs to be updated as you have indicated. I am fine with teh article and proposed changes by the press office team.
Mariana Kotzeva - 10 July 2013
11 July 2013: corrections made by Catherine Coyette
11/07/2013 - published by B6