EUROPEAN UNION

Historical EU Budget 2004 Adopted 

The European Parliament gave its final approval to the 2004 European Union budget in late December - with a figure of €99,724 billion, which is just 2.3% up over the 2003 budget. "The budget for 2004 is historic, it is the first for the enlarged Union", European Budget Commissioner Michaele Schreyer said. "And it is at a historically low level, which proves that worries about enlargement exploding the budget have been wrong", she added. The budget covers the costs of additional posts of new member states staff in EU institutions. Most of the external actions, human rights and Common Foreign and Security Policy and relations with Third countries budget lines have saw an increase in the budget, including the Balkans (579.5 million+ 13 million in reserve, i.e. + 0.85% increase). Observable decrease can be noted in cooperation with Africa, the Caribbean and Pacific countries. Final figures for the 2004 budget are now published on the website of the Budget Committee of the European Parliament.

T.H.