Romanian agriculture’s value has increased exponentially in recent years, from RON 417 billion in 2007 to over RON 669 billion at the end of 2014, said on Wednesday Agriculture Minister Daniel Constantin at the opening Indagra 2015 fair.
“2015 was a difficult year for agriculture and despite the fact that we still have much to do in agriculture, I can say that, overall, it registered an extraordinary progress. Since 2007, when we joined the EU, we managed two consecutive years to export more than we import, in 2013 and 2014. The value of agriculture in terms of contribution to the gross domestic product has grown exponentially. If in 2007 the contribution was of RON 417 billion, it reached RON 669 billion in 2014,” said Minister Constantin.
He said that the European funds Romania benefited since 2007 hitherto (over EUR 8 billion in investments and over EUR 8 billion in direct payments) contributed to the development of the Romanian agriculture and to the progress of local food industry.
President Klaus Iohannis attended the Indagra Fair opening on Wednesday, saying Romania has huge agriculture potential, and yet it imports a considerable proportion of agri food product and foodstuffs. The Romanian President also stated he would like agriculture to stop being a field of paradoxes, but a performance sector.
“We have hard-working people, with initiative, but we lack infrastructure. And from time to time we blame it on the weather or, on the contrary, we expect a good year in agriculture dependent on the weather. I think it’s time to overcome this stage once for good and to turn the Romanian agriculture into a really competitive sector, that doesn’t depend either on the weather or on other circumstances and where we should invest,” Klaus Iohannis said.
He also argued that a quarter of the population works in agriculture, but only 4.7 percent of GDP comes from the agriculture exploitation.
President Iohannis underlined that Romania has a huge agricultural potential, but unfortunately Romanian products are hard to find on the market. He gave an example, pointing out that Romanians have the best apples in the world, and yet, over 80 percent of the apples consumed are coming from the imports.
“I am a patriot in this field (…) but we import so much that it’s a real art to find Romanian products if you want to put something on the table. We must change this situation,” he said while visiting the fair’s stalls.
