President of OPEKEPE: A series of actions allowed the improvement of the amounts in the liquidation of the basic aid

The president of OPEKEPE, Dimitris Melas, spoke to the Athenian-Macedonian News Agency about the actions taken and resulting in the improvement of the amounts granted as a liquidation of the basic aid against the amount of the advance.

He analyzed the last large payment made by the Organization for this year and thanked the employees of OPEKEPE, who, as he characteristically said, “once again managed to stand up to the circumstances by making every effort to grant aid to the Greeks. farmers before Christmas “.

Regarding the cases of producers who were not paid, according to the President of OPEKEPE this was done as there were errors in the submission of applications in relation to the property status while as he said “discrepancies were identified in the extent, between the declared in EAE 2021 and the one that has been declared in E9 to AADE until 31/5/2021 “.

However, as he stated “the relevant problems were solved at a rate of more than 75% in this payment, while there is the possibility of further correction with administrative acts until 31/1/2022”.

Finally, Mr. Melas spoke about the changes made by the Organization, regarding the granting of aid for the calendar year 2021 but also why they took place at the end of the programming period.

The following is the interview of the President of OPEKEPE

OPEKEPE proceeded with the granting of the aid for the year of applications 2021. Tell us what aid the farmers received?

On Wednesday 22.12.2021, direct payments for applications 2021, totaling 851,647,764.36 euros, were paid by OPEKEPE. The amount granted to farmers this year is about 40 million euros higher than the corresponding amount granted in December 2020.

These aids concern the following:

– Balance of basic aid amounting to 332,332,959.15 euros to 594,463 beneficiaries corresponding to the total eligible amount (100%). In the amount of basic aid mentioned, the amount of approximately 31 million euros concerns rights deriving from the national reserve for the year 2021. Together with the advance payment given last October, the total basic aid paid to Greek farmers amounts to the amount of 965,767 .722.59 million euros.

– Green aid amounting to 491,308,426.18 euros to 600,137 beneficiaries

– Aid for young farmers amounting to 28,006,379.03 euros to 64,881 beneficiaries (10,000 more beneficiaries compared to last year).

I would like to thank all the employees of OPEKEPE, who once again managed to stand up to the circumstances by making every effort to grant aid to Greek farmers before Christmas. Despite the special conditions in the daily work due to the covid-19 pandemic and the lack of staff, they worked overtime with excessive zeal and responsibility in order to meet the increased demands.

What is the reason for the significant improvement in the amounts granted as a liquidation of the basic aid against the amount of the advance;

1. OPEKEPE after the grant of the advance payment:

(a) proceeded with a series of actions in order to use more recent data from other databases that affect the calculation of the eligible amount. Indicatively, it is mentioned that through the excellent cooperation that has been developed with AADE and for that I would like to publicly thank the Governor of Ms. Pitsili, we have been provided with all the necessary information regarding the number of areas owned by farmers based on the declaration of assets, date of acquisition of the lands, financial data for the status of active farmer, data for the identification of the beneficiary, etc.

b) Clear instructions were given to the Declaration Centers for the management and correction of the obvious errors during the submission of EAE 2021 regarding the declared data for the property status.

2. The payment lots also included an additional 50,000 farmers who had not received an advance payment as the eligible amount was less than EUR 250.

3. Managed problems that occurred due to obvious errors in the submission of applications in relation to the property status. Discrepancies were identified in the area, between the one declared in EAE 2021 and the one that has been declared in E9 in AADE until 31/5/2021, without this necessarily meaning non-documentation of their ownership, or non-possession on 31.05.21 for all or part of the parcels declared in the Single Aid Application 2021 in relation to the data kept in AADE. The relevant problems were solved at a rate of more than 75% in this payment, while there is the possibility of further correction with administrative acts until 31/1/2022.

4. The handling of area discrepancies detected by incorrect declarations in Natura zones has yielded 100% of the basic aid entitlements to farmers and any impact on green aid will be considered in the near future.

5. The problems related to the eligibility were improved by 50% while the review of the problematic parcels by OPEKEPE continues, even for those beneficiaries who did not submit eligibility requests.

6. The first processing of allowances from the national reserve for the year 2021 has been completed. The eligible amount was granted to the farmers who were considered eligible.

7. 99% of the control of transfer requests was completed and the eligible aid was granted to the recipients of the rights despite the increased number of transfer requests (approximately 42,000) compared to previous years (approximately 25,000).

What changes did OPEKEPE make to grant aid in the calendar year 2021? Why was it deemed necessary at the end of the programming period?

A. According to a decision of the WEU of 17 December 2020 (relevant question C-216/19), States were required to systematically monitor aid entitlements and related aid applications in order to prevent and, where appropriate, to correct irregularities committed.

In this context :

(i) the data of the declared area in the assets of the farmers were used to confirm or not the data declared to the EAE.

(ii) additional specific controls have been introduced in categories of farmers with specific characteristics, such as the following:

– farmers who declared areas that had been used for the implementation of the JMC pasture allocation

– farmers who declared private land in new eligible pasture land 2021

farmers allegedly holding more than 100 hectares

B. The amendment of the JMC distribution of eligible pasture areas was issued in order to integrate the other national options related to Rural Development Measures, to rationalize the criteria that breeders must meet in order to receive eligible pasture areas and criteria were introduced for the restricted area. for distribution of pasture areas.

C. A relevant Ministerial Decision was issued for the prevention and fight against fraud by farmers who, through artificial conditions, try to benefit from the direct aids and specifically of the National Reserve.

D. The Land Recognition System for pasture areas has been updated, an obligation arising from the Action Plan imposed by the European Commission, to which more than 7.5 million acres of new pasture areas in the Territory have been added.