The original objective of production support was to bolster the traditional fibre flax crops which are mainly grown in Belgium, France and the Netherlands.

We need to make the fibre flax and hemp sector more market-oriented so that it is able to make an effective, indisputable and useful contribution to the economy and is no longer the target of public criticism.

Mr President, over the past couple of years, we have seen a sharp increase in the acreage of fibre flax and hemp as a result of subsidy-hunting in Member States such as Great Britain and Spain.

The present initiative is particularly timely as the results of the campaign to promote olive oil and fibre flax, to which Mr Fantuzzi also referred, are already available. Sales of these products outside the Community have increased thanks to ad hoc methods of promotion.

During the years of the independence of Lithuania Plungė's economic was based on the factory of fibre flax and cotton Kučiskis - Pabedinskiai and also on the activities of Jewish businessmen and agricultural products made by Samogitian farmers.