Appeal of Serbian farmers – State aid necessary for survival of cooperatives

Agricultural cooperatives should have priority when allocating funds from state incentives, because through them, cooperatives are also helped. The cooperatives also expect the limits when allocating subsidies, which are currently limited to 100 hectares, to be abolished.

These are some of the demands from the thematic meeting entitled “With cooperatives to modern mechanization” organized by the Cooperative Alliance of Vojvodina, which was held in the village of Klek near Zrenjanin.

Yields from 1200 hectares

Despite reduced yields due to drought, the Agricultural Cooperative “Agroklek” from Klek has provided 17 thousand tons of coarse food from its 1200 hectares of fields, which is enough for 1200 dairy cows through the winter.

Everything produced in the fields is used for milk production. With this concept, this year they have achieved a milk yield per cow of 10 thousand liters, which is at the top of production in Serbia. The only way to maintain this is through constant investment.

– It is normal here to invest between 500 and 800 thousand euros annually. Without that, we cannot move forward. You are now in a cooperative that has not had a blocked account for a day since 1997 – points out Radovan Bokic, director of the Agricultural Cooperative “Agroklek.”

Cooperatives like this can still withstand unfavorable market conditions, but not for long.

Cooperatives need state support, it was emphasized at this meeting.

– The incentives that are currently being implemented for up to one hundred hectares and 300 heads of livestock should be expanded in such a way that they are implemented on the total area, on the total number of livestock, because it is precisely these cooperatives that are driving our economy forward that would invest the most with such incentives and contribute the most to the farmers who do business with them – says Jelena Nestorov, president of the Cooperative Alliance of Vojvodina.

Investing in machinery

Investing in new machinery is a priority, because better quality processing means higher yields. Tractors are at the top of the wish list, medium and high-power ones.

– That’s somewhere between 110 and 150 horsepower, that’s what’s in focus – says Predrag Acimovic, a representative of a distributor of agricultural machinery.

He states that “large systems, large companies need more than 150 horsepower.”

– Today, the key is how to reduce costs in these times when yields, when there is drought, climate change are present, so these initial inputs are very important in the production segment – says Acimovic.

Incentives for cooperatives for more than a hundred hectares would not be a big expense for the state, according to the Cooperative Association of Vojvodina, because there are only 63 of those which process more land than that quota in Vojvodina.

Zadružni savez Vojvodine Novi Sad

Zemljoradnička zadruga Agro Klek

Klek

Cooperative Alliance of Vojvodina

Agroklek

Radovan Bokić

Jelena Nestorov

Predrag Aćimović

agricultural cooperatives