Romanian government promises to provide assistance to farmers whose crops were damaged by the heat

The Romanian government plans to approve a farmland insurance system to help farmers whose crops have been affected by drought, Agriculture Minister Florin Barbu said on Wednesday, Reuters reports.

“First, we talked to the banks and the financial regulator, and we agreed on a formula for… a mechanism to create a drought insurance system for 7 million hectares of farmland, taking into account spring and winter crops,” Barbut said.

“This mechanism provides compensation of up to 3,000 lei ($671.14) per hectare, which will unlock credit for Romanian farmers.”

He did not specify when the scheme would be approved or put into effect.

Other measures that he said the government would approve in the coming days include increasing state guarantees for agricultural loans, providing state compensation of up to 1000 lei ($223.71) per damaged hectare before winter crops are planted, and freezing loan repayments until December 2025.

In July, Barbu said that nearly 2 million hectares of corn and sunflower crops have been damaged, a figure some analysts have called an underestimate.

“I don’t agree with the minister’s estimates, the damage is higher,” Caesar Gheorghe of the Romanian grain market consultancy AGRIColumn told Reuters.

He also said that measures such as freezing loan payments to farmers will affect sellers and distributors of raw materials.

According to Gheorghe, this year’s corn production in Romania will fall to 6.7 million tons, which is significantly lower than the estimates of Argus and AgroBrane at 7.5 million tons and 7.7 million tons, respectively.

According to his estimates, the sunflower harvest will fall below 2 million tons in 2024, while the wheat harvest will be 9.6 million tons.

Tags: corn, subsidies, Romania, drought, sunseed