56 Mr. Collins asked the Tánaiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs the indepth study, if any, he has initiated into the implications of the enlargement of the European Union. [11740/95]

The Deputy will be aware that the European Council meeting held in Essen — December 1994 — requested the Commission to submit as quickly as possible its detailed analysis of the effects of enlargement in the context of the Union's current policies and their future development. In addition it called on the Commission to submit, in 1995, a study of means of developing relations between the EU and the associated countries of Central and Eastern Europe — CEECs — in the agriculture sector with a view to their future accession. The results of these indepth studies are awaited. It is expected that the report on EU-CEEC relations in the agriculture sector will be available before the end of the year. Last July, the Commission published detailed reports on the agriculture sector in each of the associated countries.