1. To meet the needs of the common agricultural policy, a Community network for the collection of farm accountancy data is set up (hereinafter referred to as the ‘data network’).
2. The purpose of the data network shall be to collect the accountancy data needed for, in particular:
(a)
an annual determination of incomes on agricultural holdings coming within the field of the survey defined in Article 5; and
(b)
a business analysis of agricultural holdings.
3. The data obtained pursuant to this Regulation shall, in particular, serve as the basis for the drawing up of reports by the Commission on the situation of agriculture and of agricultural markets as well as on farm incomes in the Community. The reports shall be submitted annually to the European Parliament and the Council, in particular for the annual fixing of prices of agricultural produce.
For the purposes of this Regulation, the following definitions shall apply:
(a)
‘operator’ means the natural person responsible for the day-to-day management of an agricultural holding;
(b)
‘category of holding’ means a group of agricultural holdings which belong to the same categories as regards the type of farming and economic size as defined in the Community typology for agricultural holdings established by Regulation (EC) No 1242/2008;
(c)
‘returning holding’ means any agricultural holding making returns for the purposes of the data network;
(d)
‘division’ means the territory of a Member State, or any part thereof as delimited with a view to the selection of returning holdings; a list of such divisions appears in Annex I;
(e)
‘accountancy data’ means any technical, financial or economic data relating to an agricultural holding derived from accounts consisting of entries made systematically and regularly throughout the accounting year.
At the request of a Member State the list of divisions shall be amended in accordance with the procedure referred to in Article 18(2), provided that the request concerns the Member State's divisions.
