These were the conclusions of ZF’s open editorial meeting ZF Expert, which was attended Thursday by Sorin Minea, owner of cold cuts producer Angst and president of the food industry owners’ association Federatia Romalimenta, Florin Beiu, advisor on farming policies at the Agriculture Ministry, Gabriel Popescu, university professor at the Faculty of Agricultural Economics within Bucharest’s Academy of Economic Studies, Ion Florescu, manager in charge of agricultural statistics at the National Statistics Institute (INS) and Vladimir Alexandrescu, communication manager of the INS.
Agricultural production amounts to over EUR7 billion per year, but this year could bring its value towards EUR10 billion considering the record-high crops, as well as thanks to the prices of over EUR200 per ton of wheat and of corn.
“Grain crops went up by 10% on average this year, for corn the increase will be 15% and for sunflower of over 20%,” says Florin Beiu, manager within the Agricultural Policies Department of the Ministry of Agriculture and of Rural Development (MADR).
The first data show that farmers this year harvested around seven million tons of wheat, 23% more than last year, thanks to the highest yields per hectare recorded in the last ten years, according to data from the National Statistics Institute. “The yield for wheat was 3.6 tons/hectare this year, up from 2.9 tons/hectare in 2010. This will result in a wheat crop of 6.6 to 7 million tons,” said Ion Florescu, general manager of the Agricultural Statistics Department within the statistics institute. As a result, this year’s wheat crop will bring a total of EUR1.4 billion euros into the pockets of farmers, twice as much as last year.
Although it is important for Romania to have a strong agriculture, economic growth should not rely heavily on this sector because agriculture means resources, not processing, and strong economies are all the stronger when agriculture has a lower share in the gross domestic product, says university professor Gabriel Popescu.
(English version by Daniela Stoican, editing by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)