Commission Regulation (EC) No 555/2008Show full title

Commission Regulation (EC) No 555/2008 of 27 June 2008 laying down detailed rules for implementing Council Regulation (EC) No 479/2008 on the common organisation of the market in wine as regards support programmes, trade with third countries, production potential and on controls in the wine sector

[F1Section 6a U.K. Innovation

Article 20a U.K. Eligible operations

1. The innovation in the wine sector referred to in Article 51 of Regulation (EU) No 1308/2013 shall consist of the development of the following:

(a) new products related to the wine sector or by-products of wine,

(b) new processes and technologies necessary for the development of grape wine products.

2. The eligible costs shall concern tangible and intangible investments for knowledge-transfer, preparatory operations and pilot studies.

3. The beneficiaries of support for innovation shall be producers of the products referred to in Part II of Annex VII to Regulation (EU) No 1308/2013 and wine producer organisations.

Research and development centres shall participate in the project supported by the beneficiaries. Interbranch organisations may be associated to the project.

4. Beneficiaries of support for innovation may request the payment of an advance from the paying agencies where that option is included in the national support programme. The payment of the advance shall be subject to a requirement to lodge a security.

5. Simple replacement investments shall not be eligible expenditure.

Article 20b U.K. Demarcation with rural development and other legal regimes and financial instruments

Member States shall introduce clear demarcation criteria in their national support programmes to ensure that no support is granted under Article 51 of Regulation (EU) No 1308/2013 for operations supported under other Union instruments.

[F2Article 20c U.K. Financial management

1. Support shall be paid once it is ascertained that either a single operation or all the operations covered by the support application, according to the choice made by the Member State for the management of the measure, have been implemented and controlled on the spot.

Where support is normally payable only after implementation of all the operations, by way of derogation from the first subparagraph, support shall be paid for single operations implemented if the remaining operations could not be carried out due to force majeure or exceptional circumstances as referred to in Article 2 of Regulation (EU) No 1306/2013 of the European Parliament and the Council (1) .

If checks show that an overall operation covered by the support application has not been fully implemented for reasons other than force majeure or exceptional circumstances as referred to in Article 2 of Regulation (EU) No 1306/2013 and where support has been paid after single operations which are part of the overall operation covered by the support application, Member States shall decide to recover the aid paid.

2. Beneficiaries of support for innovation may request the payment of an advance from the competent paying agencies if this option is included in the national support programme.

[F3The amount of the advances shall not exceed 20 % of the public aid related to the investment in innovation, and its payment shall be subject to the establishment of a bank guarantee or an equivalent guarantee corresponding to 110 % of the amount of the advance. However, in the case of investments in innovation for which the individual decision to grant support is taken in the financial years 2014, 2015 or 2016, the amount of the advances may be increased to up to 50 % of the public aid related to the investment concerned. For the purposes of Article 23 of Delegated Regulation (EU) No 907/2014 the obligation shall be to spend the total amount advanced in the implementation of the operation concerned two years after its payment.]

The guarantee shall be released when the competent paying agency establishes that the amount of actual expenditure corresponding to the public aid related to the innovation exceeds the amount of the advance.] ]