Beneficiaries’ accounts are credited with aid amounting to a total of 780 million euros and relating to Linked Aid, Ecological Schemes, Basic aid, newly entrant farmers and redistributive aid 2023, far exceeding the initial announcements of 700 million euros.
With a view to transparency and the valid and timely information of the producers, following clarifying instructions for the beneficiaries.
With regard to the granting of coupled aid for the coupled aid schemes for the crops of edible legumes, forage legumes, maize, apples, leguminous legumes, seeds and given the non-timely registration in the application in the prescribed period of registration of quantities, OPEKEPE assures the specific beneficiaries that there is no cause for concern and precisely because he is aware of the problem, he will enable operators and producers in the coming days to take any corrective actions and registrations in order to make supplementary payments to those who are entitled to them as soon as possible.
With regard to the linked aid for the cultivation of seeds and as there are no ELGA findings, the cases that were affected due to extreme weather events will be dealt with by force majeure requests to the competent regional offices of the Agency to be included in the next supplementary payment.
Given that this year is the first year of implementation of the CAP SS and the first year of implementation of the new eligibility conditions for linked aid, the services of OPEKEPE and the General Directorates of Agriculture and Food of the FSAAT, evaluated some findings of the payment that need immediate further examination and control .
It is noted that what is mentioned in the CAP SS is impossible to change or modify at the given time and formed the basic principles of resource allocation.
Important differences between the years 2022 and 2023 are that in many of the aids, the eligibility conditions and the amounts of the aids have changed, following those listed in the CAP’s SS.
Differences are also found in the requirement of deliveries in all regimes. For example, in 2022 there was no requirement for deliveries in pulses but also in other terms such as e.g. for the aforementioned apples. Nevertheless, in the context of the consolidation of the Organization and its correct and transparent operation with the aim of more fair payment of aid, all the above issues will be re-examined, immediately after the completion of the payments.
In accordance with the commitments of the political leadership of the HYPAAT, all those cases that held more than 16,500 producers hostage are being checked and for the cases where no findings are made, the payment procedures proceed. Already for 2023, of these, 6,850 beneficiaries are being paid who were checked and no findings emerged. For cases where there have been findings, the sanctions procedure will be followed, as provided for by national and EU law. The same applies to the cases where producers had appealed to Justice for non-payment of their subsidies by OPEKEPE and were vindicated, as well as for 2,480 pending cases since 2014.