EU Authorizes Romanian RON1.3B Aid Scheme For Farmers

04.20.2011 By Ioana Tudor

The European Commission on Wednesday has authorized a Romanian state aid scheme with a budget of 1.3 billion lei (EUR1=RON4.0858) which aims to support farmers who face difficulties due to the economic crisis.

The European Commission on Wednesday has authorized a Romanian state aid scheme with a budget of 1.3 billion lei (EUR1=RON4.0858) which aims to support farmers who face difficulties due to the economic crisis.

The scheme provides subsidies of up to EUR15,000 per farmer, said the EC. Aid under the scheme can be granted until 31 December 2011 and will take the form of direct subsidies.

According to the EC, the scheme is an application of the Commission's Temporary framework for State aid measures to support access to finance, adopted in December 2010, in order to allow EU member states to grant limited amounts of aid to primary agricultural producers.

The scheme is available for farmers in all sectors of primary agricultural production, provided they were not already in difficulty on 1 July 2008 (before the beginning of the crisis).

The Commission also authorized in February a RON120 million subsidized loan scheme for Romanian farmers, said the EC.