The governments of Moldova and Japan have signed the Agreement on the augmentation of the Technical Assistance Project for disadvantaged farmers on Thursday, January 11. It provides for a grant to the total sum of JPY 230 mln or about USD 2 mln. The Agreement was signed by the Minister of Agriculture and Food Industry Anatolie Gorodenco and the Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Ambassador of Japan to Moldova, Mutsuo Mabuchi. The Project on the technical assistance for disadvantaged farmers was implemented in Moldova in 2000, being financed by the Government of Japan with about JPY 1.7 bln or about USD 14.5 mln. The project aims at increasing the agricultural and food production by improving the technological operations in the process of harvesting grains, reducing the consumption of fuels and performing high-quality sowing and other works made with combines, tractors etc. To date, the project provided the farmers with 80 Sampo combines, 42 MF 4270 tractors, 21 Landini-115 tractors, 82 Kubota tractors, 815 Belarus-82 tractors, 20 mobile irrigation systems, on the whole 1335 units of agricultural equipment and machines. The equipment is sold to the beneficiaries via auctions and the instalments are paid within 4 years. The PM Vasile Tarlev said at the meeting with the Japanese official that this project is the most efficient agricultural project implemented in Moldova. Having this agreement signed, Japan became the first country from the Brussels’ group of donors to implement the pledges related to the financing of Moldova.