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Romania is set to invest the highest amount so far - 20 million euros - in a wool washing and processing program, and the Unirea Agri-food Trade House will buy the entire amount of wool from sheep farmers, Agriculture Minister Petre Daea declared on Tuesday in Parliament during the debate of the simple motion lodged against him.
"The 'Wool, Choose the Sheep' national program, the duly granted and correctly applied subsidies have led to the increase of livestock, but unfortunately you mutilated these programs through government decisions, beginning with [former Prime Minister Ludovic] Orban and ending with the Save Romania Union. Let me tell you that we are making the largest investment so far in wool washing and processing, worth 20 million euros. The first production capacities will emerge next year, so that the entire amount of wool can be put to use in Romania through modern, environmentally compliant methods, and the entire amount of wool will be bought from all sheep breeders by the Trade House, which belongs to Romania and the Romanians, an entity you destroyed but which we brought back to life," Daea stated.
With regard to the coupled livestock breeding support for the sheep and goat breeding sector, the agriculture minister emphasized that the eligibility requirements haven't changed compared to the 2014-2020 financial period.
"Although the European Commission has said that the sheep/goat breeding sector is not in difficulty because the livestock and meat production are on the rise, the management of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development argued that there are no sheep breeds primarily raised for meat production in Romania and that the profitability of the animal husbandry sector is low. Practically, the main goals are to improve the genetic quality of sheep stocks and increase the number of animals from dedicated meat breeds," the minister explained.
Thus, the coupled livestock breeding support paid in 2022 covered 4.3 million sheep, with an amount per head of animal of 15.8 euros.
"Calculations carried out by specialized institutions show that the lowest profitability is in holdings with an animal headcount between 150 and 500. If only the rams entered in the genealogical registers would have been taken into account, the number of animals to benefit from the coupled livestock breeding support would have been practically cut by half. Yet, in order to cover the sheep flocks in holdings with 150-500 heads, which represent the segment with the lowest profitability, rams with certificates of origin were also considered to ensure a ratio of one ram for 35 ewes," Petre Daea detailed.
