Romanian agriculture and organic food
The organic food sector provides a good opportunity for a revival of Romanian agriculture
Florentin Căpitănescu, 22.09.2014, 13:18
During the communist era, agriculture was one of the country’s strongest sectors, in particular its wheat and corn production. The state’s huge investments in irrigation systems and factories making farming equipment, not to mention the quality of the soil, led to extraordinary outputs in the sector. However, the entire system was based on command economy, following the state’s forcible appropriation of privately owned land between the late 1940s and the early 1960s.
After the collapse of the communist regime in 1989, agriculture gradually become the Cinderella of the Romanian economy in the absence of efficient management and the lack of investments, as well as the return of the land seized by the communists. In recent years, however, agriculture has begun to contribute more significantly to Romania’s economic growth.
According to statistics, Romania’s corn production is the second largest in Europe for the fifth consecutive year, after France. While Romanian farmers produce, on average, 4.4 tonnes of corn per 2.6 million hectares, French farmers produce 9.5 tonnes of corn per 1.7 million hectares. These figures show that extensive farming is no longer practiced in Romania.
Also, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development says that in the first 6 months of the year, Romania exported food worth more than 2 billion euros, which is almost 10% more than in the same period last year. Moreover, quality farming is practiced on 85% of the entire Romanian agriculture sector, said the under-secretary of state with the agriculture ministry, Daniel Botanoiu, at the ECO Festival for organic products held last week in Bucharest. He also said Romania may become Europe’s supplier of organic products because it uses the lowest quantity of nitrogen per hectare on the continent.
As an example, Romanian farmers use 20 times less nitrogen than Dutch farmers. It remains to be seen whether the hopes of the Romanian official come true, as this sector needs more than hopes, promises and inspiring words to become a real success.
