The Ministry of Agriculture suggests introducing a special regime in agriculture for farmers affected by drought, similar to the one used in Romania. Minister of Agriculture Vladimir Bolea said that once approved, the law will allow farmers to stop the rise in penalties imposed by creditors by presenting only the calamity certificate, IPN reports.
After analyzing the situation in the districts of the Republic of Moldova and Romania’s experience, it was decided to establish a special regime for the farmers affected by drought. The opinion on the draft law is to be approved by the Cabinet on Wednesday. The Ministry of Agriculture will ask Parliament to adopt the draft law by the end of the week after giving it two readings.
“Performing an objective analysis of everything that happens, taking into account the fact that documents from district divisions still come, we proposed a draft law. I cannot give details of the draft law, but soon we will have all the approvals from the relevant ministries. I mean the Ministry of Justice, the Ministry of Finance and the NAC. We want to debate it in the Cabinet’s meeting this Wednesday and adopt an opinion on it. The draft law is to be passed by Parliament and there we will present details of it. We took the Romanian model as a basis. I paid a visit to my colleague and counterpart, Mr. Barbu, to consult with him on the effective measures taken by Romania. The establishment of this regime is one of the measures given the fairly large number of farmers affected this year. We will request Parliament to give two readings to the bill this week,” Vladimir Bolea stated in the program “At 360 Degrees” on Radio Moldova.
Currently, the farmers can ask to stop the increase in penalties imposed by banks and fertilizer providers based on the force majeure certificate issued by the Chamber of Commerce and Industry. Vladimir Bolea assured that after the special regime is introduced in agriculture, this process will be simplified.
“It was taken into account the fact that we have many affected farmers and all these people have debts to banks, to creditors that supplied them with fertilizers. Currently, each farmer needs to obtain a force majeure certificate for each of the creditors from the Chamber of Commerce and Industry based on the calamity certificate. This requires financial resources, time, involvement. In Romania, based on an emergency ordinance, the farmer goes individually with the calamity document, without presenting the force majeure certificate, to sign additional agreements with creditors. In our country, this law will benefit the farmers who suffered as a result of the 2024 drought. It goes to farmers who have drought documents. In the Republic of Moldova, such documents were provided in almost in all districts,” said the minister.
The Commission for Emergency Situations last week approved the allocation of 100 million lei from the Government’s Intervention Fund for the partial compensation of the losses incurred by agricultural producers as a result of this summer’s drought and extreme heat. The money is granted to farmers whose wheat and corn harvests were affected in the proportion of at least 70% and 60%, respectively.
