2011 budget on agriculture to focus on flooding prevention

TIRANA, Jan. 17 – The 2011 budget on agriculture, which minister Genc Ruli says is biggest ever during the past 6 years at 79 million dollars, will focus on measures to prevent flooding in the northern Shkodra region following last year’s bad experience when several areas of the country’s biggest northern region were inundated five consecutive times during the year.
Speaking at a press conference to unveil the 2011 priorities, minister Ruli said investments worth 30 million dollars or 4 times more than in 2009 will be made in the problematic Shkodra and Lezha regions where drainage and river protection infrastructure will be put in place.
The agriculture ministry says it will start implementing a flood protection project as soon as a World Bank funded study is carried out on the hydro regime, river dams and drainage system of the Shkodra region where the country’s three biggest hydropower plants are situated. The ministry expects to rehabilitate 30 km of dams for the Buna, Kir and Drin rivers flowing in Shkodra and take several other measures to rehabilitate drainage systems. Protection investments will also be made in the Korca lowland, southeast Albania, in a 5,000 hectare areas.
The Agriculture, Food, and Consumer Protection ministry described 2010 as the best year since 2006 as far as agricultural production and exports are concerned. According to minister Ruli, agricultural production in 2010 grew by 8 percent in 2010, up from an average of 3 percent during the past four years while exports rose by 30 percent.
Olive cultivation, which has been supported by state subsidies in the past few years, grew by 40 percent or 20,000 tonnes compared to 2009.
The ministry says some 2,000 new hectares of olive groves, 275 hectares of grapes and 550 hectares of fruit trees were planted in 2010 under state support schemes.
The 2011 budget will continue supporting Albanian farmers with subsidies even for newly included nut trees such as hazelnut, almond, chestnut, pomegranates apart from the national programme of olive.
Food safety and the approximation of legislation with the EU will be two other priorities for the ministry in 2011. Amendments to existing laws will make possible that a considerable number of families who use agricultural land will be provided with ownership titles, which because of legal and bureaucratic obstacles they have been unable to obtain during the past 20 years.
Despite the significant increase of up to 40 percent compared to the revised 2010 budget,
this important sector to the Albanian economy will continue being the least government-funded among the other four priority sectors of education, health, defence, and transport.
Finance Ministry data show the 2010 budget on the agriculture ministry was cut to 0.41 percent of the GDP to 5.05 billion lek (50 million dollars) in mid-2010, down from 0.59 percent of the GDP in the previously approved budget.
Government expects the GDP on this vital sector of the Albanian economy to climb to 0.63 percent of the GDP only by 2013.
The Agricultural and Rural Development Agency (Payments Agency) will continue receiving state support until the European Commission accredits it as a reliable agency for the management of future EU funds.
The Agriculture, Food and Consumer Protection Ministry says it implemented only 54 percent of the budget projected on development projects during the first nine months of this year. In a report published on the monitoring of its budget, the ministry says it had executed only 2.9 billion lek (30 million dollars) during the first nine months of this year, slightly more than half of the total 5.4 billion lek under the reviewed 2010 budget.
The agriculture sector, employing the majority of people in rural areas where all people are considered self-employed because of possessing land, continues to be one of the main sectors of the economy, generating about 18.5% of GDP (in 2008) and 48.3% of total employment. Around 500,000 people work in agriculture, of whom 55% full time and 45% part time. Labour productivity in agriculture is only 30% of labour productivity in the rest of the Albanian economy and 20% of the EU. More than 50% of the total Albanian population lives in the rural areas where agriculture is the main economic activity.