The Agriculture State Fund will inspect and make payments on all hitherto unhandled 301 projects under SAPARD by the year's end upon full assistance on the part of the beneficiaries. The Fund's Executive Director Kalina Ilieva said this before the MPs of the Agriculture and Forests Committee and the Committee of European Affairs and Control of European Funds with the National Assembly on Wednesday.

For this purpose the beneficiaries are expected to present the necessary documents for payment of the subsidy within the term, specified by the Fund. The two committees were familiarized with the prospects for the successful completion of SAPARD in Bulgaria after, a week earlier, Brussels unfreezed blocked funding under the program.

As of today unpaid subsidies total 150,164,971.82 leva within a total of 301 projects. Of these 106 are municipal projects with a subsidy of 68,662,170.42 leva. The remaining 195 projects are private, of which 168 under measures 1,2,3 and 5 with a subsidy of 81,105.565.40 leva. The remaining 27 projects are under the Agroecology measure and the subsidies within them equal 259,590leva.

Changes should be made in Agriculture State Fund, which is in the focus of attention both of farmers and of the European Commission, Agriculture Minister Miroslav Naydenov said before journalists. He was commenting on draft amendments to the

Assisting Agricultural Producers Act, moved by former cabinet member Meglena Plougchieva and considered by the Agriculture Committee.

The Committee rejected one of its provisions envisaging that the Agriculture Fund employees be given the

status of civil servants. The Paying Agency is a type of a bank and the people in such institutions are not civil servants, he commented.

Source: BTA