Bulgarian Tobacco Producers Launch Nationwide Protest over Distribution of Subsidies

Bulgarian tobacco producers are staging a nationwide protest over the distribution of state subsidies.

Tobacco producers will organize road blocks at the Danube Bridge, the road to Greece at Gotse Delchev, and the Kapitan Andreevo border crossing point on the Bulgarian-Greek border at noon on Friday, according to reports of Sega daily.

Starting Monday, scores of tobacco producers in two northwestern villages in the Silistra municipality and the Tutrakan municipality are going on a hunger strike.

The disgruntled industry representatives called for the resignation of the Agriculture Minister at a meeting in Parvomay, stressing the flawed method of distribution of state subsidies in the sector.

Asen Kyuchukov, Deputy Chair of the National Association of Tobacco Growers (NAT-2010), explained in a Monday interview for the Bulgarian National Radio that the Association sought the reinstatement of the previous method of distribution of subsidies.

He expressed the opposition of NAT-2010 to the plans of the Agriculture Ministty to allocate 96% of the resources to small producers, i.e. the group uniting the largest number of producers.

Kyuchukov emphasized that large-scale producers "provided jobs to at least 50 000 people more."

The Deputy Chair of NAT-2010 noted that an initiative committee had been organized to coordinate the protests, adding that attempts to apply discriminatory practices would not be tolerated.

Kyuchukov said that NAT-2010 had decided on Sunday to withdraw confidence from the Chair of the Association, Tsvetan Filev, stressing that NAT-2010 distanced themselves from any media statements of Filev.

He declared that representatives of NAT-2010 would take part in talks with the government, provided that...