Common Agricultural Policy Discussed at the Workshop Organised by AIPA
On Tuesday, July 2, the ex- European Commissioner for Agriculture, Rural Development and Fisheries Franz FISCHLER, participated in the “EU’s Common Agricultural Policy” workshop, organised in Chisinau by the Agency for Intervention and Payments for Agriculture (AIPA) with the participation of the Minister of Agriculture and Food Industry, Vasile BUMACOV.
The Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) is one of the milestones of the European integration that provided to European citizens five decades of safe food and dynamic rural areas. CAP was created in order for the people to enjoy quality food for affordable prices, and for farmers to earn a decent living.
Launched in 1962, CAP is a partnership between agriculture and society, between Europe and its farmers. Its main objectives are to enhance the agricultural productivity in order to guarantee food supply security for affordable prices, as well as ensure a decent living for EU’s farmers.
Mr. Fischer also referred to the CAP objectives and system, the European model of agriculture and the economic base. The ex-European commissioner pointed out that CAP helps farmers not only to produce food, but also to protect the environment, to improve animals’ living conditions and to support viable rural communities. Speaking about the CAP plans, he mentioned that the policies were designed to strengthen the food chain and introduce new and more favourable criteria for the small farmers.
The Head of the Budget Department, Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, Environment and Water Management of Austria, Mr Ernst Unger presented Austria’s Rural Development Program for 2013-2020, emphasizing the most important opportunities for the rural areas from the multifunctional agriculture perspective.
Michaela Pichler, deputy chief of the Austria Agrarmarkt Department for International Cooperation, presented the key institutional elements on the absorption of the EU funds for agriculture and rural development during the pre-accession period (the IPARD program – the legal basis, functions and responsibilities). The importance of implementation of a Twinning project or other technical assistance project with a view to develop the Agency’s institutional capacities was stressed.
Both Mr. Fischler and Mr.Bumacov mentioned that rural development and agriculture were essential, and that this partnership would lead to higher quality levels, thus creating the necessary conditions for meeting the requirements needed for accreditation according to the EU standards, and for the further harnessing of the ENPARD funds.
We would like to mention that the expert mission will be in the Republic of Moldova for 4 days, during which its representatives will visit several business representatives.
We reiterate that the Austria expert mission was possible due to the signing of the “Support for the Agency for Intervention and Payments for Agriculture (AIPA) in Moldova” experience exchange program with a total budget of EUR 71,000, co-funded with EUR 33,000 by the Know-how exchange program (KEP) of the Central European Initiative (CEI).
This project will raise AIPA to a higher quality level, in order to enhance the collaboration and to provide training for AIPA specialists on subsidization mechanisms and European funds ,management, electronic processing of subsidization applications, the post-payment inspection, internal audit, financial administration of payments, development of electronic registers of farmers and digitization of subsidization applications.
