A modern facility, twice the capacity, contemporary production technology, increased labor force and a closed production cycle are the advantages of which the owner of a livestock farm in Balldren of Lezhë talks about with enthusiasm following on from the investments and the supporting schemes. This farm, which is another evidence of the new agricultural policies adopted by the government, was visited today by Prime Minister Edi Rama.

Thanks to the support of the Agency of Agricultural and Rural Development, the farmer has the ambition to double the livestock number in a short time. He thanked for the support received not only from the AARD but also from the fiscal policies of the government. “We have received from the AARD 50% funding to which we added another 50% to build the shed and the grain barn. Thanks to the new law on customs, the government support was extremely helpful especially for the new machineries and technology equipment, because we paid zero VAT. We intend to add another 200 cows. We have currently 300 of them and we will make them 500″, the farmer said, In addition, he explained that this support has given the opportunity to increase the number of employees to 150 people.

According to the Prime Minister this is the result of the new approach to support the countryside, focused on the promotion of investments for strengthening productive infrastructure, which creates also an employment chain. “This is the change we brought along with a totally new perspective of the support to the countryside. Instead of giving pittance and have no results, we are strengthening growers and manufacturers, in order to give cultivation and production centers the opportunity to create an employment chain. Thus, closed cycles will increase employment by hundreds of thousands of jobs across the territory”.

The Prime Minister explained also the advantages of the administrative reform for the promotion of agricultural development.

“With the administrative reform and the new City Hall, which is now no longer merely the administrator of the city area and which has been surrounded by many municipalities that had nothing to do with you and your work, we will move to a stage where the City Hall will have more responsibilities, whether for irrigation, or drainage, but also for prioritizing the most important investments in cooperation with private individuals of the region. We will build several regions of shared management, so that major problems concerning water, transport, waste, but also development promotion in agriculture, are  treated in such a way that the government knows where to make the first, the second and then the third intervention, asking for your advice and receiving added value. Actually, the combination of irrigation and drainage with the transformation of boards, which are a direct responsibility of the City Hall – the law has been prepared by the government and will be taken to parliament – will allow it to manage the uncultivated land along with private individuals, and make it fit for cultivation. But it can be cultivable again only through the production cycle, and not by those who have it but have no possibility to develop it. Instead, those who are owner of the uncultivated land will enter the production cycle”.

The Prime Minister talked to the farmer who runs this farm that the multiplication of these investments will make the agricultural sector revive.

The Prime Minister was accompanied in this visit by the minister Mimi Kodheli, MPs of the region of Lezha, Monika Kryemadhi and Gjovalin Kadeli, and by the Mayor Viktor Tusha.