Commission adopts preliminary draft 1998 budget
The European Commission has adopted the Community's preliminary draft budget for 1998. The draft budget will be finalized by the Council and Parliament during the course of 1997. It maintains the Commission's policy of recent years which aims to contribute to budgetary stability in the Member States, in preparation for the single currency, by limiting increases to below the levels allowed in the financial perspectives. Proposed expenditure during 1998 will amount to ECU 91,307 million in commitments and ECU 84,727 million in payments. This means a total increase over the 1997 budget of less than 3% in both categories. The proposed growth in agricultural spending and spending on internal and external policies is limited to 0.5%, with the focus of the budgetary increase on the Structural Funds. As in 1997, the Commission aims to target funding within the limits of the overall budget. Additional funding will, therefore, go to research and development, the trans-European networks (TENs), and on small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Other activities which will see increases include education and training programmes and the technical assistance programmes for third countries, PHARE and MEDA.