Romania: Agri outlook and EU funds
Recently, the Agricultural (LNV) Office in Romania, together with the Netherlands-Romanian Chamber of Commerce (NRCC) organised the event called “The future of Romania’s agriculture. A Dutch-Romanian perspective” during the INDAGRA agri-food fair of this autumn.
As the two key presentations describing 1) the situation and outlook of the Romanian agri-food sector and 2) the use of EU funds for this sector have been well received particularly good, it is worth sharing them with a larger Dutch business community - potentially interested in the developments in this region.
The first presentation was provided by ING Romania and besides giving a bird-eye view of the sector, some sub-sectors were also put into the spotlight: cereals, oilseeds, dairy and pigs. The second presentation, containing an overwhelming amount of data and overviews, was provided by Reeve – a professional consultancy company with extensive experience in accessing EU funds in Romania. So extensive that it took the opportunity to also highlight shortcomings and propose its own solutions.
Before wishing you a pleasant reading, let us highlight some very recent news about EU agri funds for 2023-2027, as just announced by the Romanian Ministry of Agriculture.
Romania will most likely receive the approval for its National Strategic Plan this December, after having submitted the last clarifications to the Commission observations. The main measures which will be financed are:
Young farmers: 170 million Eur, max. 200,000 Eur/project, 65%-80% financing (for existing young farmers) + 250 mln. EUR for new young farmers, max. 70,000 Eur/project, 100% financing
Forest curtains (wind-breaks): 12 mln. Eur, max. 200,000 Eur/project, 100% financing
Irrigation:
secondary irrigation infrastructure: 400 mln. Eur, 1.5 mln. Eur/project, 100% financing
stand-alone irrigation solutions: max. 500,000 Eur/project, 65% financing
[primary infrastructure is the responsibility of the public authorities and shall be financed through the National Irrigation Programme]
Agricultural machinery, 100 mln. Eur, max. 300,000 Eur/project
Food processing: 400 mln. Eur, project threshold increased to 10 mln. Eur/project for: combined feed, grain processing, sunflower processing (to reduce exports of raw materials)
Development of rural areas: 850 mln. Eur for infrastructure (200 ml. Eur), investments in non-agricultural activities (150 mln. Eur), LEADER/Local Action Groups (500 mln. Eur)
LNV-Team Bucharest, Romania