Views on lease of arable land in Vojvodina differ

BELGRADE - Serbian Agriculture Minister Snezana Bogosavljevic-Boskovic and acting Vojvodina province secretary for agriculture Branislav Bugarski expressed differing views on lease of arable land in the northern Serbian province.

Bogosavljevic-Boskovic and Bugarski met at the Ministry of Agriculture on Monday, primarily to discuss the agricultural combines Jadran from Nova Gajdobra and Backa from Sivac, the Agriculture Ministry has said in a release.

The minister said that leasing agricultural land and a joint investment by Serbia and the Al Rawafed company from the United Arab Emirates in the combines would be beneficial to both the two parties and to the development of the region in Vojvodina.

She told representatives of the Provincial Secretariat for Agriculture that the biggest part of the investment by the joint company would be used to build processing systems, which should boost production of finished products.

Bugarski said, however, that the kind of arrangement in question could not contribute to the development of agriculture in that region and that new negotiations should be opened with the investor from the UAE and a review of the contract be carried out to protect the interests of local farmers.

He said that farmers in Sivac and Gajdobra and other places in Vojvodina should have the same rights and opportunities to acquire land through leasing, instead of just being treated as "second-class farmers."

Bugarski pointed out that Vojvodina's farmers were not in a position to take up state-owned land on a 40-year lease like the investor from the UAE, to whom the land was offered at prices much lower than market ones.

The UAE investor acquired the land at a lease price of EUR 250...