The European Commission will today decide whether to give Spain the €71 million compensation requested by the government relating to the damages suffered by farmers during the ‘killer cucumber crisis’ after Germany wrongly accused Spain of being the source of a deadly e.coli outbreak.
Why the actual culprit, also the accuser, is not being held accountable for the losses is an entirely different matter.
The compensation package has been basically agreed with the compensation requests of the majority of EU member states but deferred a decision until today because there were doubts about the validity of one or two requests and the Commission asked for ‘clarification’.
One of these countries is Poland, current holder of the EU Presidency, which has been asked to revise its initial compensation claim of €81 million.
The European Commission created a compensation fund of €210 million, which will cover about 50% of the losses sustained by the various member states. The compensation will be made immediately available to farmers by the respective member governments who will be reimbursed at a later stage.
The EC will also be considering claims by Spain, Italy and France for compensation relating to the production of nectarines and peaches as a result of ‘collateral damage’ arising from the ‘killer cucumber crisis’.
Experts will be studying the claims although no decision is expected to be taken until after the summer.