07/05/2019
Meeting of the SCTM Network for Agriculture and Rural Development
The meeting of the SCTM Network for Agriculture and Rural Development took place on 5 July 2019, at the M Hotel in Belgrade. The Network Meeting was held within the framework of the project "Institutional Support to the SCTM - Phase 3" with the financial support of the Government of Switzerland. About 110 representatives from 68 local self-governments participated at the meeting, as well as the representatives of the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Water Management - the Rural Development Sector and the Agricultural Land Administration, local action groups and the SCTM. Representatives of local self-governments are mostly employees dealing with agriculture and rural development issues, implementing the public bidding procedure for leasing agricultural land as well as local economic development.
The Network Meeting started with the emphasis of the importance of applying different sources of incentives in promoting rural development with the presentation of planned activities undertaken by the SCTM in improving the application of incentive procedures at the local level in order to acquire new knowledge and information and to exchange good practice examples. In the first part of the Network meeting participants were introduced to the procedure for preparing and implementing local rural development strategies according to the LEADER principle. The representative of the Sector for Rural Development of the Ministry presented a Rulebook on incentives to support programs related to the preparation and implementation of local rural development strategies in line with the LEADER approach, adopted on 18 January 2019, as well as the progress made in the process of accreditation of the measure 7 - diversification of agricultural holdings and development of business with a focus on rural tourism.
Participants of the meeting were also introduced to the contracting process and obligations regarding the implementation of incentives, as well as reporting on the realization of activities, scoring applications and paying incentives in accordance with the List of eligible costs. Incentives are paid in the order of duly submitted requests, with the condition that the Commission for Evaluation rated local strategies of rural development with more than 80 points, but with the available funds.
Following the presentation of the LEADER measure, the participants were introduced to the process of accreditation of the measure 7 - "Diversification of agricultural holdings and business development" within the IPARD II program, as well as the activities of the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Water Management with regard to the preparation of incentive programs to support the development of non-agricultural activities from the national budget. The program envisages about 1.7 billion dinars for this measure, and its realization is foreseen in the beginning of 2020. The specific objectives of the measure is investment support for the development of tourist facilities and services for agricultural producers and other economic entities in rural areas, and hence the expansion of economic activities in the country in the field of rural tourism, as well as support for the development of tourist and recreational activities, especially for family and children tourism. The measure is applied in rural areas, in accordance with the definition in the IPARD II program.
At the moment, the Proposal Regulation on the conditions and method of using incentives for improvement of economic activities in the countryside through the support to non-agricultural activities which will be financed from the national budget is being prepared. For these purposes, the national budget defined RSD 110,000.000. The incentives are determined in the percentage value of the realized eligible investment, reduced by the amount of funds in the name of value added tax, in accordance with the law regulating incentives in agriculture and rural development. The incentives will be directed towards the rural tourism sector with the aim of providing catering services in authentic catering facilities in domestic crafts or rural tourist households, as well as in the sector of old and art crafts or domestic crafts.
The second part of the meeting started with the presentation by representatives of the Administration for Agricultural Land about the progress of the realization of the annual program of protection, arrangement and use of state-owned agricultural land. This year, out of 145 units of local self-government, 120 programs were approved by the Administration. The amendments to the Rules were adopted on 22 June 2019, and are mostly related to the poultry sector. About 12,000 hectares of agricultural land were returned to the old owners by the restitution process, while around 276,000 hectares of agricultural land were leased out through active contracts. After the presentation, the participants had the opportunity to clarify with the representatives of the Agricultural Land Administration the ambiguities that they have during the implementation of the Programs themselves. Many issues were related to leasing land that is in the process of land consolidation, as well as the uncertainty of the number of parcel to specify in the contracts. As a transitional solution it is envisaged that the old parcel numbers will be given in the process of contracting, but after the completion of the consolidation process to replace old parcel numbers with new by changing the contract on leasing. There was great interest in the possibility and way of long-term land lease.
At the end of the Network meeting, a representative of the working team engaged by SCTM in drafting a model document and institutional steps for implementing the Program of Support Measures for Implementing Agricultural and Rural Development Policy at the local level provided information on the models of documents under preparation. Given that there is number of measures in the Codes of measures, the SCTM has decided to draw up model acts for the three measures that are most common (investments in the physical assets of agricultural holdings, the establishment and strengthening of unions in the field of agriculture and reproductive material - artificial insemination), which can be applied to all other measures with minor corrections. Other acts follow the implementation of these three measures. The final versions of the documents are expected to be completed in July and will be presented at the next meeting of the Network, and will be available on the SCTM website. The participants were also introduced to institutional steps in the preparation, implementation and monitoring of the implementation of the Program of Measures for Support for Implementation of Agricultural Policy and Rural Development Policy at the local level.
