Olsson (ELDR), rapporteur. (SV) Mr President, Commissioner, it looks as if, this evening and tomorrow, we shall be able to solve the issue of the views to be taken of hormones and their use in connection with animal rearing in which there is a dispute between the EU and the United States. I shall address this issue in three ways. Firstly, I wish to express my gratitude; secondly, I wish to explain why I do not like the compromise; and thirdly, I wish to explain why, in spite of everything, I support the compromise.

I want to address a very big thank-you to everyone who has contributed: to the Commission, the Council, the committee secretariat and all my colleagues and fellow MEPs in the committee – the shadow rapporteurs – who have been of very great help to us in reaching this solution.

It really is, of course, the case that we do not want these hormones, especially oestradiol 17β which is used, for example in the United States, as a growth stimulant. We do not want them in our food and nor, for that reason, must we of course use them in such a manner that they may end up in our food. In that way, we should be more credible in our negotiations, for example within the WTO, with the United States. If they are used as growth stimulants, then they are clearly present in our food. They involve a health risk for human beings and are carcinogenic. If we use them therapeutically in the rearing of agricultural animals, there is also a risk of their being present. That is what we do in the EU, and it undermines our credibility and our opposition to these hormones. That is why, in principle, they should really be comprehensively banned in these contexts. If we had banned them completely, as proposed by our committee, it would have been almost possible to exclude them from the market. There would then have been no danger of their being used in the wrong way.

The committee was in agreement – as was Parliament, mainly, at first reading – about proceeding in this way. This is, however, an issue that needs to be solved. Even if I had full support for my desire for a total ban, I personally realised that it might be sensible to try to reach a compromise. I therefore contacted my fellow MEPs in the other political groups and said that we should perhaps try, for the fact of the matter was that the Council said that it wanted to retain the substances for three reasons: firstly, to induce rutting in cattle, which is the most important area of usage; secondly, for foetus maceration and mummification, also mainly in the case of cattle; and, thirdly, for pyometra in cattle. Of these areas of use, the first is the main one and the other two of relatively little importance. The latter two are, moreover, relatively important from the point of view of animal protection. Animals suffer if they cannot be given this medicine in the present situation. Even though there are alternatives, they were not believed to be accessible throughout the EU.

My proposal, which became our proposal following contact with the other political groups, was that we should propose to the Council that the substances be kept for the purposes of the two less important areas relating to dead foetuses and pyometra. The Council accepted this, and we shall now be able to do away with use of the substances for inducing rutting, something I consider to be major progress. There will certainly be a transitional period, but then they will have been dispensed with. In the final proposal, we now say, moreover, that the second use too should be reviewed, and perhaps that too could be removed after a certain period.

I see this as major progress, and we can thus perhaps solve the problem. I am extremely pleased that we in the committee have been able to unite in supporting the proposal, and I hope that this will also be the case in the vote in the Chamber tomorrow. We shall therefore be able to phase out the main use and thus strengthen our hand in the dispute with the United States. I therefore want to reinforce this compromise, which is certainly weaker than what Parliament previously put forward but is still sufficiently sound for us now to be able to find a solution to the problem.