Prime Minister Edi Rama attended a meeting with local government officials and residents in the town of Permet today, launching a tour of meetings throughout the country to discuss performance of local government, new investment projects, as well as the government measures to deal with the challenges in this time of serious crisis ahead of the upcoming winter season, increasingly seen as the toughest winter after the World War II, because of the war-driven inflation and Putin’s aggression on freedom and Western democracy.
Prime Minister Edi Rama took part in a conversation with local tour operators and agri-tourism entrepreneurs in the southern municipality of Permet.
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Thank you very much for being here!
I really wished to meet representatives of the tourism operators and agri-tourism entrepreneurs operating in this area of the country, because Permet is one of the areas where one can clearly see a radical transformation and steadily increase in demand as well as in supply of the tourism offer.
Alma noted that the number of visitors, including foreign tourists as well as local visitors from Tirana or elsewhere from Albania, as well as other countries and Albanian-speaking territories, was totally unimaginable just a few years ago.
I remember pretty well how we embarked on our path here in Permet and the state of depression and gray monotonous mood prevailing here back then. The legend of the city of roses still existed only, whereas the town’s road and civil infrastructure was totally dilapidated. The few hospitality facilities, including the legendary hotel in the centre of the town, barely survived with an accommodation and booking rate estimated at just 5, 10 or 15% only.
The situation is completely different today. Of course, by saying the situation is different now I don’t mean that we have already reached the point of arrival, but as it is the case with everything else, things have changed like day and night all over the country. If we consider the height we aim for, we are still just taking the initial steps.
However, one thing is for sure, Permet and the surrounding areas, where agritourism is developing rapidly thanks to individuals like you, because what we do is of a relative importance if what people do is not of an absolute importance and if people fail to respond and chase a vision and a planned path through the incentives and encouraging measures, designed to provide the conditions which started being created through the Urban Renaissance Programme here in Permet.
It is for sure that if we were to fail in the efforts to keep the electricity price unchanged for all guest-houses and small businesses, a good part of you, if not all of you, would have gone bankrupt and you would have been forced to cease operating and abandon your businesses, as a high energy price would made it impossible for you to go on with the business activity, let alone think about increase income and profits for your families, as it is actually the case.
One should take a look at what is happening in much wealthier countries like Italy where businesses, hotels, agritourism businesses are being shut down on a daily basis, as they can’t afford the soaring electricity bill. It is vital for us to protect every household and small business during the upcoming hard winter. Not only that, but we also plan to help bigger businesses, as they face tremendous difficulties too. We have set an electricity consumption and price cap in a bid to promote primarily energy saving and reduce excessive electricity consumption by a certain number of households that exceed this consumption limit of up to 800 kWh a month, which is sufficient to meet everyday life needs. This electricity price cap was meant to enter into force as of October 1. Setting this electricity price limit was postponed, because, I repeat, we wait and see the slightest opportunity to allow us take another step towards relieving the burden on the households and the small businesses in particular. A minor opportunity was created, allowing us to postpone application of the electricity price cap and not let the decision enter into force in October, because consumption fell, according to us, not because of stable good weather conditions, but because consumers are increasingly becoming aware of the need to save electricity. On the other hand, recent rains were not enough to allow us to relax in terms of the water level at the main dams and hydropower plants and the meteorological services that forecast weather conditions accurately suggest that we still have to wait for abundant rainfall in November too. However, we are exploring each and every opportunity, which we currently lack, and therefore we should just save electricity.
To all of those who claim that things have gone from bad to worse, I would say that the planned state budget for 2023 is twice as much as the 2013 state budget.
As we speak, we are mulling ways to impose an extraordinary taxation on the energy producers. It is a tax imposed in times of crisis, because it is impossible that a group of people – despite all the due respect for them – large companies that have invested and operate in electricity production score mindboggling net profits, while we question whether we would be able to properly increase the monthly wages of fire fighters during these three months, because it is really heartbreaking for me that we couldn’t afford increasing their salaries higher than 7%, although they are forced to deal with a growing number of blazes and wildfires in Albania, as it is also the case everywhere else all over the world.
Just a few years after the new policy on agritourism development and the support of new guesthouses and projects to transform the private family homes into agritourism businesses, this nascent industry or this new component of our tourism industry is thriving. I am truly convinced that Albania will become a champion for the agritourism sector in the Mediterranean in the next 10 years.
