​WB TO PROVIDE US$12 MILLION TO FARMERS WHO SUFFERED FROM RUSSIA’S BAN ON IMPORTS

The Ministry of Agriculture and Food Industry of Moldova and the World Bank (WB) agreed that the bank will provide US$12 million for assistance to agriculture producers, who suffered from the ban on import of goods to Russia, introduced in autumn 2014.

According to Deputy Minister of Agriculture Vlad Loghin, horticulturists and viticulturists will receive compensations.

“The WB will provide credit with 0.6% interest rate, while the government will provide money in the form of gratuitous compensations for small enterprises, whose agricultural lands do not exceed 15 ha”, said he.

According to the Deputy Minister, negotiations are almost complete and soon the Ministry and the Government will announce about the start of the compensations program.

Infotag’s dossier: After the embargo on Moldovan fruit import, introduced by Russia in July 2014, as well as on vegetables and canned food in early September, the Government decided to compensate to farmers their losses due to the impossibility to sell their goods on the traditional Russian market. For this, the procedure of receiving compensations was adopted, according to which 138 million lei are additionally allocated from the budget. Later, 16 million lei more were added to this sum, provided for compensations for plums. The government is paying 1.5 lei per each kilogram of apples and 1.2 lei per 1 kg of plums. The cost of production of apples, in condition of fulfilling all the agro-technical methods, accounts for 2.5 – 3.5 lei. Without spraying, this price makes 2 lei.

This amount of money was not enough for paying all the debts to agriculture producers and the government started negotiations with the WB for getting money to pay compensations to the producers of late varieties of grape and apples.