Albanian gov't doubles agriculture budget for 2018

Source: Xinhua| 2017-11-08 19:44:11|Editor: Zhou Xin
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TIRANA, Nov. 8 (Xinhua) -- The Albanian agriculture sector is slated to get a higher state support for 2018 as the government has decided to double the budget for this sector.

Referring to the draft budget for 2018, it results that the funding for the country's agriculture and rural sector places a renewed focus on the farm sector in a bid to revive agriculture growth and improve farm incomes, experts from the ministry said Wednesday.

Experts said that the state budget funding for agriculture in 2018 was expected to grow by 55 percent, amounting to 2.6 billion lek (22.6 million U.S. dollars), up from 1.7 billion lek it was allocated in 2017.

The new budget funding will support growth of agricultural production, food safety and consumer protection, and agro processing, draft budget reads.

Agriculture Ministry also informed that government funding for consumer protection and food safety policies was set to increase by 270 million lek.

By increasing funds, Albanian government expects higher growth of agricultural and farming production and the domestic agro-processing.

"Investment and growth of domestic agricultural production will keep generating export growth, making the agricultural sector the backbone of the country's economy," experts told reporters.

Agriculture sector contributes around 20 percent of the country's economy while it is also the sector with highest number of employees.

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