This was reported by the Agriculture Ministry, noting in particular that the delegation, headed by State Secretary Alexandra Sheehan, is in Brussels from 19-23 May. The goal is to strengthen the dialog with the European institutions and to promote technical preparations for the start of negotiations on Moldova’s accession to the EU and the possibilities to receive assistance at the pre-accession stage.
The delegation includes representatives of the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Industry, the Agency for Interventions and Payments in Agriculture (AIPA) and the National Agency for Food Safety (ANSA) involved in the process of developing and implementing policies in the agri-food sector.
The program of the visit includes meetings with representatives of the European Commission, the Council of the European Union and the European Parliament, as well as with farmers’ organizations and agricultural cooperatives of the EU. The purpose of these meetings is to identify the most effective approaches to negotiate transitional periods regarding the implementation of European policies in the Moldovan agro-industrial sector.
According to the Ministry of Agriculture, the dialog with decision-makers in Brussels provides the Moldovan delegation with an opportunity to discuss relevant aspects of the verification process, in which state institutions are currently involved. This stage is all the more important as the assessments in areas related to the agro-industrial sector are nearing completion and preliminary meetings with the European Commission on chapters coordinated by the Ministry of Agriculture are scheduled for June this year.
Also, special attention is paid to the form of cooperation of the member states with the European institutions, as well as to the experience of the candidate countries in this process through the prism of Moldova’s Mission to the EU and Germany’s Permanent Representation to the EU.
Alexandra Shean said that the direct discussions between the representatives of the Moldovan state bodies and the key EU institutions contribute to the consolidation of the institutional capacities needed at the stage of preparing the negotiations and advancing to the member state status. In her opinion, the existence of agricultural bodies with solid administrative capacities, especially in the field of elaboration, analysis, implementation and monitoring of agricultural policies, as well as in the management of support payments, is a prerequisite for all EU candidate countries.
The study tour is part of a comprehensive program of support provided to the Government of Moldova in the process of European integration in the field of agriculture and rural development within the framework of the project “Moldovan-German Agricultural Policy Dialogue” (APD Moldova), implemented within the Bilateral Cooperation Program funded by the German Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture.
