The European Commission has granted 30.3 M€ as 50% contribution for programmes running in 14 member states between one and three years, for the promotion of EU agricultural products including fruit and vegetables, meat, dairy products, honey, flowers, fibre flax, PDO, PGI and TSG and organic products.

The European Commission has apodted 19 programmes in 14 Member States (Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Germany, France, Greece, Italy, Ireland, the Netherlands, Poland, Slovenia, Spain and the United Kingdom) to provide information on and to promote agricultural products in the European Union.

These programmes are financed under the framework of EU Regulation 3/2008 on information provision and promotion measures which merged the previous provisions and cover both the internal market and third countries, on December 2007.

The measures financed can consist of public relations, promotional or publicity actions, in particular highlighting the advantages of EU products, especially in terms of quality, hygiene, food safety, nutrition, labelling, animal welfare or environment-friendliness of their production. These measures can also cover participation at events and fairs, information campaigns on the EU system of protected designations of origin (PDO), protected geographical indications (PGI) and traditional speciality guaranteed (TSG), information on EU quality and labelling systems and organic farming, Information campaigns on the EU system of quality wines produced in specified regions (QWPSR) are also amongst the possibilities.

The EU finances up to 50% of the cost of these measures (up to 60 % in programmes promoting the consumption of fruit and vegetable by children or concerning information on responsible drinking patterns and harm linked to hazardous alcohol consumption), the remainder being met by the professional/inter-branch organisations which proposed them and/or by the Member States concerned.

The detailed rules for applying those promotion and information measures are laid down by Commission Regulation (EC) Nº 501/2008 of 5 June 2008, which lists the themes and products that can be covered by the promotion measures. Within this scheme Commission recently adopted support for the promotion of dairy products in 13 programmes in 11 member states for an amount aid of almost 18 M€.

Each year, by 30 November, interested professional organisations can submit their proposals to the Member States, which then have to send the Commission the list of programmes they have selected and a copy of each programme. Subsequently the Commission evaluates the programmes and decides on their eligibility.