The asking price for the small and very small plots is now close to the average price at which plots of hundreds or thousands of hectares change hands.
“The small owners take advantage of the introduction of the new land law and ask for a higher price. Before that, the price for small plots stood at EUR2,500 to EUR3,000 here (in Iasi County, NE Romania i.e.),” says Liviu Balanici, general manager of Panifcom, a farming, livestock and bakery business that generates EUR5 million in annual revenue.
The sale system set by the new farmland transaction law allows making this segment of the land market transparent, which has attracted the attention of the major institutional investors in the last few years.
Most expensive land ZF found in the ads is located in Constanta (SE Romania) and the cheapest in Mures (central Romania), with the seller of the former asking for EUR7,000/hectare and the seller of the latter asking for less than EUR1,000 per hectare.
The asking price in Constanta is so high because of the proximity to the Black Sea harbor, which makes it possible for farmers to sell their harvest at prices close to the export (FOB) prices.
The price is Mures is so low, because this is not exactly a traditional grain, sunflower and rapeseed cultivation area.
The price of Romanian agricultural land went up 25-fold between 2002 and 2012, at a 40% yearly pace.
Romania has 13.5 million hectares of farmland, the sixth biggest surface area in the EU and foreign investors own or have long-term leases signed for 12% of it.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)