Minister of State for Agricultural Economy György Czerván outlined that the European Commission acknowledged the critical situation on the EU milk market. There was a consensus among agricultural ministers that mobilisation of EU funds is unavoidable to alleviate the unsustainable situation farmers are facing.
During previous negotiations Hungary highlighted the necessity to adopt a new direct support package financed from the EU budget with at least the same level of support as in September 2016. This objective has been fulfilled. It is a very important result for Hungarian farmers that the larger part of the 500 million package has been allocated to national envelopes. Hungary will have the possibility to pay 9.54 million EUR (3 billion HUF) as targeted aid to milk producers. György Czerván underlined that Member States should have the maximum level of flexibility for the distribution. Further details of the proposed measures will be elaborated at expert level during the coming weeks.
Hungary in cooperation with other Member States has requested to increase the rate of advance payments to 70 per cent for direct payments and 85 per cent for area-based rural development payments from 16 October 2016. The European Commission announced that it will prepare the necessary legislation to fulfil this request.
