The Regional Secretary for Agriculture and Forestry stated today that the amendments made to the POSEI programme in recent years, besides being positive, have yielded tangible benefits for farmers and for the development of the agricultural sector in the Azores, an effort that should further strengthened in the future.
 
"POSEI has been an essential financial tool to help developing agriculture, compensate farmers for the extra production costs, stimulate the growth of production, encourage the increase of quality schemes, maintain the agricultural activity of smaller producers as well as to boost the quality and value of agricultural productions," stressed João Ponte.
 
The government spoke on the sidelines of the presentation of the amendments to POSEI programme for 2020, which took place at the São Miguel Exhibition Park in the municipality of Ribeira Grande.
 
In the presence of several hundred farmers and other agents of the agricultural sector, João Ponte stressed that the POSEI aid should be regarded as an incentive to the production of high quality and safe food from the standpoint of food safety.
 
According to the Regional Secretary, the stimulus for the growth of agricultural production provided by POSEI stemmed from the increase in budget appropriations. This is evident in case of the maintenance of vineyards, which tripled, and in the aid for the production of fruit and vegetables, which grew 20% between 2017 and 2020.
 
Moreover, POSEI has encouraged the growth of production under quality schemes due to exemptions from apportionment, increases in aid to Organic Production Mode, Protected Geographical Identification (PGI) certification and protected designation of origin (PDO) certification.
 
João Ponte also highlighted that POSEI has been essential to maintain the agricultural activity of smaller farms, through the exemption from apportionment in the Bovine Slaughter Premium, Pineapple Production Premium and the Milk Producer Premium. This measure has prevented cuts of 83% for meat producers, 65% for pineapple producers and 43% for milk producers.
 
This was possible because the premiums were fully granted to the first 10 animals of all meat producers per semester, to the first 150 thousand kilograms of milk produced by all farms and to the first 2 thousand square metres of all pineapple producers.
 
The government official stressed that the amendments approved by the European Commission for POSEI in 2020 were the result, as usual, of joint and coordinated efforts undertaken by the Regional Government with the producer organisations, namely the Azores Agricultural Federation.