Romanian government reaches agreement with farmers after six days of protests

The Romanian Ministry of Agriculture and representatives of large agricultural organisations have reached an agreement after six days of farmers' protests.

Euractiv reports. 

Agriculture Minister Florin Barbu disclosed that the agreement encompasses 13 farmers’ demands. Discussions will keep on to find a compromise on outstanding requests.

The government committed to fully subsidising all agricultural excise until 2026 and promptly enacting regulations for subsidised interest loans.

The Romanian government also satisfied the claims for compensating losses caused by imports from Ukraine. Measures include clear labelling for cereals and other goods and electronic monitoring of seals using GPS at the port of Constanta.

One of the farmers' representatives at the talks said that the signed agreement does not mean an immediate end to the protests, as negotiations with the carriers are still pending. They are protesting to change the terms of mandatory motor third party liability insurance, to exempt agricultural machinery and trucks from periodic technical inspections, to abolish mandatory GPS installation, to improve the agricultural credit system, and to ban the import of Ukrainian grain.

In addition, the Minister of Agriculture denied that Romania was seeking an import duty on grain from Ukraine.

On January 15, the Hungarian Ministry of Agriculture announced that the governments of Bulgaria, Poland, Hungary, Romania and Slovakia would impose import duties on Ukrainian grain, citing unfair competition. They sent a letter to the European Commission asking for action, saying that cheaper agricultural products from Ukraine were eating into their export markets