Division 5 Planned financing of the scheme

Because of the involvement of many organisations, including public administrations (the Commission budget, for example, is annual), it has been difficult to establish precise budgets during the last three years.

The requirements of the Community Eco-label Scheme have two main components: the resources for product group development and those for marketing and promotion.

The estimated resources devoted to the Scheme in 2003 (Commission plus Member States), were about EUR 3,2 million (not including salaries). The financial funding from fees was about EUR 370 000, which represents about 11,5 %. This means that the self-financing capacity of the Scheme is slightly above 10 %, which is far from the long term aim of self-financing.

The resources devoted to the Scheme have been adequate for the development and revision of the product groups during the last three years. They have been used in a very effective way. The increasing number of product groups and the consequent increase in the relevant marketing will logically lead to an increase in the Scheme’s budget needs. The Scheme’s budget therefore needs to be analysed in connection with the overall strategy of the development of product group criteria.

Objective

The long-term objective should be to achieve the self-financing of the Scheme and feasible short-term objectives should be set up and monitored in order to achieve it.

Actions

Before the end of the validity of this working plan, an analysis shall be carried out by the EUEB, in order to set up a coherent and realistic strategy aiming at the possibility of self-financing of the Scheme. This strategy should include a methodology for common measurement of spending and revenue from the Eco-label scheme by each Member State and on the associated reporting of financing.