The European Commission decided today to extend the de minimis rules to the transport sector for State aid not …
The European Commission decided today to extend the de minimis rules to the transport sector for State aid not exceeding €100 000 per enterprise over a three-year period. Once the Regulation has been adopted, the transport sector, like every other economic sector, will benefit from decentralised supervision of national State aid by the Member States. Such aid need not be notified to nor authorised by the Commission in advance. Only subsidies for the acquisition of road transport vehicles will still be subject to notification and prior authorisation.
By today`s decision, the Commission will extend to the transport sector the application of a Regulation of January 2001(1) under which aid not exceeding a ceiling of €100 000 per enterprise over any period of three years does not constitute State aid within the meaning of the Treaty. The Commission took the view that such levels of aid were too low to affect trade between Member States or threaten to distort competition. Consequently, aid measures of this kind should not fall under the notification or prior authorisation requirement.
It was agreed when drafting the Regulation that the transport sector should continue to be excluded from the scope, as it had been in the de minimis Communication of 1996.
This approach which entailed considerable work to supervise State aid in the transport sector is now outdated. Equal treatment must be ensured in all economic sectors, particularly on the eve of the enlargement of the Union to 25 Member States.
(1) Commission Regulation (EC) No 69/2001 of 12 January 2001 on the application of Articles 87 and 88 of the EC Treaty to de minimis aid
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