The solicitation came this week from agricultural enterprises, trade associations, workers' representatives, regions.
Thus, at the end of an initial analysis of the state of the art carried out by the Task Force established at the Ministry of Agricultural, Food and Forestry Policies to deal with the criticalities experienced by the sector following the crown virus emergency, Mipaaf has already been sent to the Commission Agriculture of the European Union a request aimed at postponing the deadlines for CAP applications by one month; to extend deadlines for direct payments to 15 October and payments for surface measures of the Regional Rural Development Programs to 31 December; to extend the implementation of the promotion and support programs of the CMOs.
"The difficulty that the sector is experiencing is evident," said Minister Teresa Bellanova, "and everything must be done to loosen the grip that tightens companies and workers. The requests we make in Brussels go in this direction and above all tend to prevent the results and efforts of years from wasting away. The postponement of a public initiative means to throw up significant investments and work, and it is a problem that must absolutely be tackled. Thus the problems in the management of some measures of the regional Development Plans. Puglia is another story. There, we must avoid that Apulian agriculture pays too high damage for the millions and millions that the Region has not been able to spend and that risk being financed ".
The text highlights the difficulties experienced by the sector in recent weeks: logistics and transport, including to non-EU countries; difficulties in implementing "the promotion and information programs of the wine, fruit and vegetables, olive oil, fruit and milk sectors in schools" with the postponement of numerous public events; impasse risk in the implementation of the CMO support programs; penalties for commercial activities with "heavy effects" also on the value of marketed production; difficulties in managing rural development measures also due to the possible slippage of the necessary checks by the paying agencies.
Precisely on this last aspect, the last passage dedicated to Puglia to underline how “the changed scenario is slowing down the actions put in place by the regional Authorities to complete the procedures for disbursing the contributions envisaged by the RDP, which were suspended due to the dispute generated ".