On June 20, Minister of Agriculture and Food industry Vladimir Bolea will meet in Brussels with European Commissioner for Agriculture and Rural Development to persuade him of the negative impact of the Ukraine war on Moldova’s agricultural sector. The official said that he will ask the European institutions to provide financial assistance for this to be distributed to the farmers affected by the drop in prices and the disruptions in logistics and supply chains as a result of Russia’s military aggression against Ukraine, IPN reports.

Deputy Premier Bolea noted that in Brussels he will present data showing what negative consequences the war in Ukraine has had ion Moldovan agriculture. Even if Moldova is not an EU member state, it seeks financial support as the EU states affected by the war.

“The European Union believes in figures. We must go and prove by figures that the Republic of Moldova has suffered as a result of the war. I go to show this to the Commission for Agriculture. I will have a meeting with the European Commissioner. I will pay a visit on June 20. It is a one-day visit. I will return on June 21. I must persuade the institutions in Brussels that we have been affected. The Republic of Moldova is not a member of the European Union, but it was affected at least to the same extent as the states that received assistance from the European Union. For the countries that are candidates for EU membership or the states that are in the neighborhood, there are different funds to which we should have access and from which we should receive funds for these to be distributed to farmers in the Republic of Moldova,” Vladimir Bolea stated in the program “Résumé” on RliveTV channel.

The minister noted that after the new Government in Bucharest is voted in, the Republic of Moldova will receive the diesel fuel promised earlier by the Romanian authorities and this will be given primarily to farmers with small areas of farmland.

“I think the new Government of Romania will be formed by Thursday and we will finish the receipt of the 4,000 tonnes of diesel fuel donated by the Romanian people. The diesel fuel will be distributed to farmers based on the positive discrimination method, which is the small farmers will be offered fuel according to the 1.7 coefficient. We focus on the support for small farmers as their financial potential is much smaller and they have many debts,” said the official.

On Tuesday, representatives of the Association “Force of Farmers” asked the Government to offer assistance to small and medium-sized farmers to prevent their bankruptcy or the farmers will stage a large-scale protest on June 19. Among the Association’s demands are to provide compensation for the production costs incurred by small and medium-sized farmers, in the amount of at least 3,000 lei per ha, to temporarily restrict the import of grain crops from Ukraine, to urgently clear all the overdue subsides and to oblige the Giurgiulesti Port to export first and foremost Moldovan agricultural products.