Land acquisition limit extended |
Tuesday, 21 December 2010 | |
The European Commission has granted Hungary the extension of transitional period for the acquisition of agricultural land. „This decision is a significant success of the Hungarian agricultural diplomacy. The past half year has gone with reconciliations; I had several discussions with the representatives of the Commission and the ministers of the Member countries, and explained our arguments for the extension” – stressed the Hungarian minister of rural development, who received the good news during the meeting of the Council for Environmental Protection in Brussels. “My colleagues and the experts have prepared an excellent documentation in which they underlined: without extension, serious disturbances would develop in the agricultural land market. Under the existing circumstances, the liberalisation of the land market would open wide space for speculative land acquisitions that would cause further decrease of competitiveness of the Hungarian agricultural producers.” Following a request by Hungary on 10 September 2010, the Commission has granted a further three-year extension of its transitional period for the acquisition of agricultural land by non-resident EU citizens and all legal entities. The Commission also calls on Hungary to speed up its efforts to complete ongoing agricultural reform and, in particular, make progress on completing restitution programmes. |