Opinion of Advocate General

Mr President,

Members of the Court,

1. The reference for a preliminary ruling which is the subject of these proceedings is for the interpretation of a number of provisions of Community legislation on the grant of subsidies for oil seeds harvested and processed in the Community. In this Opinion, I shall be confining myself to the aspects of that legislation which are the most relevant for present purposes.

2. I shall now turn to the facts which gave rise to these proceedings. In 1980, the company Comptoir National Technique Agricole (CNTA) processed two lots of sunflower seeds. The application for the ID part of the certificate, however, was not lodged until after the seeds had been processed (owing, apparently, to organizational problems resulting from a fire which had occurred in the plant a few months before).

3. CNTA took the view that the Commission was wrong not to charge the subsidies already paid by SIDO to the EAGGF and that the decision should have been challenged by French Government — traders being precluded from doing so. CNTA therefore brought proceedings in the Tribunal administratif de Paris (Administrative Court, Paris) for the annulment of the Ministry of Agriculture's refusal to grant compensation for the losses which it had sustained as a result of the fact that the amount of the subsidy in question was returned to SIDO.

4. I shall say straight away that CNTA's argument that its failure to apply for the ID part of the certificate until after the seeds had been crushed is not in breach of the relevant Community legislation, but at most contrary to a mere administrative practice of SIDO, does not strike me as tenable.

5. CNTA maintains, however, that application for the ID part of the certificate is not a precondition for the grant of the subsidy, but merely the reference point for the purpose of calculating its amount. This is because the fact that the seeds have been placed under control — the function of which is precisely that of identifying the seeds eligible for the Community subsidy — is proved by the entry documents relating to the entry of the seeds into the plant and not by the ID part of the certificate, whereas applying for the certificate is simply an administrative formality the aim of which is to certify after the event that the seeds have already been placed under control.

6. Having said that, it should be noted that the amount of the subsidy is that valid on the day on which the application for the ID part of the certificate is lodged (first paragraph of Article 35 of Regulation No 1204/72), that is to say, the day on which the seeds are placed under control (Article 3 of Regulation No 2114/71) and therefore the day on which they entered the seed mill. Moreover, since it is clear that the main aim of having these operations take place virtually concurrently is to avoid speculation, it follows that failure to comply with the obligation in question would be liable to distort the operation of the system as a whole. To leave traders free to choose on which day to lodge their applications could have the effect of encouraging them to await the most propitious time, thereby obtaining an unwarranted profit.

7. Nor do I consider, as CNTA argues, that such an interpretation of the legislation in question would be contrary to the principle of proportionality as formulated on many occasions by the Court, on the basis of which it is necessary to establish whether the means employed to achieve the intended aim correspond to the importance of that aim and whether they are necessary for its achievement.

8. In the light of the foregoing, I therefore propose that the Court's reply to the question referred by the Tribunal administratif de Paris should be as follows:

1 Origina! language: Italian.

2 OJ, English Special Edition 1965-1966, p. 221.

3 OJ, English Special Edition 1971 (III), p. 826.

4 OJ, English Special Edition 1972 (II), p. 493.

5 As amended by Commission Regulation (EEC) No 2980/78 (OJ 1978 L 355, p. 17).

6 Judgment in Joined Cases 89 and 91/86 Etoile commerciale and CNTA v Commission [1987] ECR 3005.

7 The fact that the day on which the application is lodged is the same as that on which the seeds are placed under control is confirmed, moreover, by the provisions relating to the determination of the amount of the subsidy (see Article 3 of Regulation No 2114/71 and Article 35 of Regulation No 1204/72).

8 That this — in die Commission's view at least — is the significance to be attached to lodging the application for the certificate clearly emerges from the third recital in the preamble to Regulation No 2980/78, which amended Regulation No 1204/72, cited above, in which it is stated that ... the party concerned requests that the oil seeds be placed under control at the oil mill by lodging his application for the ID part of the certificate.

9 In the same context, Article 6(2) of Regulation No 1204/72 provides that the application may be lodged no earlier than the day on which the seeds enter the oil mill.

10 See the judgments in Case C-357/S8 Hoparmann I [1990] ECR I-1669, paragraph 12, and in Case C-358/88 Hopermann II [1990] ECR I-1687, paragraphs 10 and 11.

11 See, most recently, the judgment in Case C-319/90 Pressler [1992] ECR I-203, paragraph 12.