(BRUSSELS) - The EU commission on Tuesday appealed to member states to keep their promises on development aid to the world's poorest, as food prices rise and amid signs that national purse strings are tightening.

Addressing a meeting of EU development ministers, EU Development Commissioner Louis Michel "made a strong appeal to member states to recommit and stick to their aid commitment of 2005, and most importantly to demonstrate how they will reach those targets," his spokesman John Clancy said.

The call was made after European development aid dropped to 46.1 billion euros (72.6 billion dollars) last year, equivalent to 0.38 percent of the EU's gross domestic product (GDP), from 47.7 billion euros -- 0.41 percent of GDP -- in 2006.

"On current trends the European Union will have given 75 billion (euros) less in aid by 2010 than it promised," while citing budgetary concerns, warned the Concord confederation of relief and development NGOs, which mounted a protest outside the European Council building in Brussels.

The European Union has agreed to boost its aid spending to 0.56 percent of GDP by 2010 and 0.7 percent by 2015.

Michel, wary of backsliding, asked member states to present annual plans on how they intend to reach these goals.

As the biggest donor the EU also has "the responsibility, maybe the biggest... I would not want to miss this opportunity," said Slovenian Development Minister Andrej Ster, whose country holds the EU's rotating presidency.

However a European diplomat cautioned that "member states do not want to commit too firmly. They would prefer not to commit so that they do not disappoint."

"The economic situation is difficult throughout the world," the diplomat added, with European growth this year hit by the strength of the euro and the soaring price of petrol.

After much discussion at ambassadorial level among the 27 EU nations in recent weeks, the EU presidency worked out a compromise, presented on Tuesday, which merely "encourages" the presentation of multiannual aid plans.

This is the "acceptable minimum" for countries such as Britain, Denmark, Finland, Ireland, Luxembourg and Sweden which had sought tougher language, a European source said.

In any case the European Union should "try to arrange a set of activities that will make this burden easier and which will facilitate the foreseen target," set down in the UN Millennium Development Goals under which extreme poverty would be halved by 2015, the Slovenian minister said.

While many experts agree that the food crisis is partly due to the shortcomings of subsistence farming in developing nations, the EU in particular must commit in the long term "to increase our investment in agriculture, sustainable agriculture, to improve the living condition of people," said Luxembourg Development Minister Jean-Louis Schiltz.

Aware of the problems, the EU has promised to support investment in agriculture, primarily in Africa.

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