Finance Law 2023-as previously announced by Minister Francesco Lollobrigida-dedicated generous resources to the Ministry of Agriculture, Food Sovereignty and Forestry (MASAF). (1) Following is a review of new funds established in the department at Via XX September, in descending order of economic value.
1) Fund for the purchase of essential food items by the needy
500 million of euros is the allocation, for the year 2023, of the fund ‘earmarked for the acquisition of basic necessities of foodstuffs by individuals with an equivalent economic situation indicator of no more than 15,000 euros, to be used through the use of a special enabling system‘ (art. 1.450). The ‘ration cards,’ or ‘hunger cards’ in 4.0 format.
2) Fund for innovation in agriculture
75 million euros – for each of the years 2023, 2024 and 2025 – are dedicated to the ‘Agricultural Innovation Fund‘. To encourage the development of innovation projects:
- aimed at ‘increasing productivity in the agriculture, fisheries and aquaculture sectors,’ ‘saving water and reducing the use of chemicals, and for the use of by-products.’
- through the ‘dissemination of best available technologies‘ for ‘digital enterprise management, the use of machines, robotic solutions, sensors, and 4.0 platforms and infrastructure‘ (Art. 1.428).
3) Food sovereignty fund
25 million – for each of the years 2023, 2024, 2025 and 2026 – goes to the Food Sovereignty Fund. ‘In order to strengthen the national agricultural and agribusiness system, including through interventions aimed‘ at:
- ‘protection and enhancement of quality Italian food‘,
- ‘reduction of production costs for agricultural enterprises‘,
- ‘support of agricultural supply chains‘,
- ‘market crisis management, ensuring the security of food stocks and supplies‘ (Art. 1.424).
4) Equestrian facilities
4.7 million in spending, for each of the years 2023 and 2024, is (inexplicably) reserved for active equestrian facilities. In order to ‘ensure its functionality and enable the use of its facilities by the Ministry of Agriculture, Food Sovereignty and Forestry for its own institutional purposes, resulting in a redefinition of the obligations on the racing companies‘ (Art. 1.441).
5) Containment of ‘citrus dry disease’
3 million euros – for each of the years 2023, 2024 and 2025 – go to the ‘Fund to support research activities aimed at containing the spread ofthe harmful organism “Phoma tracheiphila,” known as “citrus dry disease,” in order to counter its spread specifically to PGI cultivars‘ (Art. 1.426).
6) Refreshment of buffalo farms.
2 million of euros for the year 2023 go to the new ‘Buffalo farm relief fund‘. ‘In order to restore farms in the buffalo supply chain that have been damaged as a result of the spread of brucellosis and tuberculosis in the national territory, and in particular in the Campania region, as well as to meet the need for restocking of farms’. Fund resources ‘Are intended to increase, up to a maximum of 10 percent, reimbursements for the culling of animals‘ (art. 1.427).
7) Support for agricultural enterprises affected by grapevine flavescence dorée.
1.5 million of euros for 2023 and 2 million euros annually ‘beginning in the year 2024‘ will be bestowed in special ‘Fund for the support of agricultural enterprises affected by grapevine flavescence dorée, aimed at providing grants for the replacement, by replacement or replanting, of vine plants uprooted in vineyards affected by the same epidemic disease‘ (art. 1.433).
8) Experimenting with ‘food income’
Identical allocation – 1.5 million euros for 2023 and 2 million/year from 2024 – goes to the ‘food income experimentation‘ fund. Act to finance, ‘in metropolitan cities, as a measure to combat food waste and poverty‘,
– ‘the provision, to individuals in absolute poverty, of food parcels made from unsold food distribution ,
– to be reserved through an app and picked up at a distribution center or received at one’s home in the case of individuals in fragile categories‘ (Art. 1.434).
9) Collection of abandoned timber
500,000 euros per year, starting from 2023, is then allocated to the fund that finances projects related to the ‘collection of naturally deposited timber in riverbeds, streams, on the banks of lakes and rivers and on the seashore as a result of atmospheric or meteorological events, storm surges and floods.’ Activities that are allowed ‘to agricultural entrepreneurs‘ with the objectives of ‘curbing energy consumption,‘ ‘promoting energy production from woody biomass and self-consumption,’ and ‘preventing hydrogeological disruption in inland areas‘ (Art. 1.443).
10) Biodiversity
Just 500,000 euros for the year 2023 alone, on the other hand, go to the newly created fund ‘for theimplementation of interventions aimed at the protection of biodiversity of agricultural and food interest and the support of the National Observatory on the Rural Landscape‘ (Art. 1.303). A reconfirmation of the total disregard of Coldirette agricultural policies for the distinctive value of the agri-food production chain in Italy. As noted, most recently, in the boycott of EU funding for conversion of crops to the organic system in Italy. (2)
Dario Dongo
Notes
(1) Law Dec. 29, 2022, no. 197. State budget for the financial year 2023 and multi-year budget for the three-year period 2023-2025. On Normattiva https://www.normattiva.it/uri-res/N2Ls?urn:nir:stato:legge:2022;197
(2) Dario Dongo. The Ministry of Agriculture boycotts organic farming. Open letter. GIFT (Great Italian Food Trade). 30.12.22
Dario Dongo, lawyer and journalist, PhD in international food law, founder of WIISE (FARE - GIFT - Food Times) and Égalité.
