Notification of Regional Secretariat for Agriculture and Forestry about strategies
The Regional Government of the Azores has implemented a well-defined strategy in all agricultural sectors, seeking to improve the incomes of those involved in agricultural activities and their socio-economic conditions.
With regard to the production of milk and its derivatives, the Regional Government of the Azores has always advocated the maintenance of the quota regimes inasmuch as it considers this regime suitable for ultra-peripheral regions, such as the the archipelago of the Azores, that are subject to unfavourable geographical conditions.
In January of 2008, the Azorean Parliament unanimously approved a resolution that sets in place a compensation system for regional agricultural producers and a series of other measures that are indispensable for the region, such as the integration of 23 thousand tons of milk for domestic consumption in the quota system, reinforcing the distribution of the quota and the transfer of POSEI support funds for milk production. It is expected that these policies will continue to be implemented beyond 2014/2015.
At this juncture, faced with the possibility of the cessation of the quota system, the Regional Government of the Azores, has succeeded in its efforts to maintain the support granted to small farmers, milk-powder and butter production. The EU Commission has assured that the subsidies granted to milk products will be transferred to the POSEI programmes thus improving the juridical basis of their attribution.
These assurances were made pubic several times by the Regional Secretary for Agriculture and Forestry in the media, in meetings with representatives from the agricultural sector and in the Economics Commission of the Legislative Assembly of the Autonomous Region of the Azores (ALRAA).
Although the Government understands why the agricultural policies proposed by PSD lack innovation, it does not understand why their Members of Parliament do not remember the process of the alleged dismantling of the quota system in 2014/2015 and the resolution that was unanimously approved in the Regional Parliament (Resolution of the Legislative Assembly of the Autonomous Region of the Azores Nº 3/2008)
The Government of the Azores is available to answer to the solicitations of ALRAA but it will maintain its strategic policies in the domain of agriculture. It will not partake in demagogical press conferences or respond to the solicitations of Members of Parliament of PSD party who oftentimes do not alter a single period or comma in the aforementioned documents and resolutions.