Agricultural Growth Isn’t a Government Priority

Cristian RUSSU

Citizens who have returned to the country at the ruling party’s call are starting to realize that agricultural recovery and development is of little importance to those in power.

In recent days, Moldovan farmers have faced a new serious challenge, threatening losses and bankruptcy for orchardists. Footage of farmers trying to save the fruit harvest by means of bonfires has travelled all over the country. Abnormal cold weather this spring will obviously be another serious blow comparable to the droughts of previous years. As official figures show, the national GDP fell by 3% in 2023 alone due to the drought. The ongoing disaster will be another challenge for the citizens who, following the authorities’ call, chose to return to the country to develop agriculture to the European level. April frosts are likely to result in harvest losses for both gardeners and farmers growing other crops. Discouraged and confused farmers recently demanded meetings with government officials to elaborate immediate support measures. Ruling party’s functionaries routinely expressed concern and sent the agrarians back to tackle the damage locally. Farmers were offered to file claims of alleged damage within 24 hours, despite the rapidly dropping temperature and the overall harsh weather that made it impossible to properly gauge the extent of the damage. Few farmers could afford to centrally heat their gardens with special smokeless burners. Traditional methods of counteracting frost by fumigation of fields and orchards are now prohibited. Their use is subject to gross fines. It is already obvious that no one will compensate for the lost crops, and farmers will once again be left alone with banks demanding loan repayments. As a result of the parliamentary discussions on the agricultural development strategy by 2028, farmers were notified that the state will not provide subsidies this year. It will not even accept applications – a decision likely linked to the fact that many farmers have not yet been paid for 2024. In the new Budget +PLUS investment programme announced by the government and parliament, 200 million out of 8 billion lei of investments were allocated for agriculture and recycling, the same amount as for the canteen renovation in schools. What kind of real support for farmers can we talk about? Recently, the parliament pompously passed a bill aimed at simplifying the VAT refund procedure for agricultural producers. But in fact, most farmers simply cannot take advantage of such support mechanisms. The idea of VAT reimbursement may seem attractive to the media and the general public, but not to the farmers themselves who are tired of explaining how ineffective this tool is in practice. Thus, the growing number of small and medium-sized farmers are going broke and leaving the country. However, this state of affairs seems to fully coincide with the plans of the current authorities. Recently, the new Minister of Economic Development and Digitalization, Doina Nistor, stated in an interview with the media that Moldova is showing signs of economic recovery, as the share of agriculture in the GDP structure continues to fall, while the services sector, for example, is growing. In other words, the government and the relevant ministry no longer view the recovery and development of the agricultural sector as one of the key areas of national progress. The PAS leadership’s pre-election appeals to our citizens abroad to return to the country and apply good agricultural practices turned out to be a blatant fraud. The citizens who responded to this call and who cared for the country invested their savings – accumulated over years of labor abroad – into the national economy, which ensured a short-term consumer boom, and took loans, giving banks a chance to profit. However, when it came to reciprocal support measures from the state, the farmers were quickly dismissed. Another legislative initiative recently adopted by the ruling party is noteworthy. A provision has been introduced into the land code that allows land plots to be legally seized from small and medium-sized farmers in favor of large landowners close to the authorities. Local authorities will now have the power to dispose of lands that are either uncultivated or deem to be abandoned. That is, a farmer who has gone bankrupt today, who is unable to cultivate his land for objective reasons or who has temporarily gone off to earn money, will be left without his land tomorrow. No, formally the land won’t be taken away, but it will be leased to another interested farmer, and the lease payments will not be made to the owner of the land, but instead be deposited into a special account managed by the mayor’s office. The latter will decide how much of the rent can be received by the owner who has allowed the desolation of his land plot. I might assume that owners temporarily staying abroad will even have to pay extra to new tenants for the maintaining their plots in proper condition, which will eventually lead to the actual withdrawal of land. Rather peculiar method of stimulating the process of land consolidation in favor of large agricultural holdings that will not cause trouble to the authorities protesting like small farmers. As for different public structures that act as defenders of our farmers and are used for electoral purposes by opposition politicians from the former ACUM bloc, unfortunately, they are only useful idiots for the authorities. For instance, Alexandru Slusari’s criticizes the government stating that the PAS has requested insufficient money from the EU in the form of loans and grants. Over the past few years, these activists have been observing how the process of European integration affects the situation in agriculture, as traditional vegetables and fruits and processed products like sugar are simply disappearing from store shelves, being replaced by the goods from the EU. It’s widely understood that the EU sees Moldovan farmers as unwanted competitors, but none of the current proponents of the European integration will openly state this.