According to a report by the EU Court of Auditors, farmers in several EU countries have received excessive CoV aid in some cases. Countries like Poland, Romania, Greece and Spain have supported farmers regardless of whether they suffered losses, the Court of Auditors said today. Thus, grape growers in Andalusia received compensation three times the amount they lost.
In addition, the level of public support in the individual EU countries was very different, which could lead to unfair competition. At EU level alone, EUR 712 million from the European Agricultural Fund was made available through a reallocation of unused funds. According to the information, the countries examined, Greece, Spain, France, Poland and Romania, received a total of 490 million euros – around 69 percent of the money from the EU fund.
Basically, the auditors assessed the EU aid for farmers during the pandemic as positive: the EU reacted quickly. Right at the beginning of the pandemic, the Commission presented guidelines and measures that would have guaranteed smooth food transport and the use of systemically relevant seasonal workers. The responsible examiner Joelle Elvinger also emphasized that after the pandemic, a second crisis had now emerged. The Russian war of aggression in Ukraine poses a major challenge to the security of the food supply.
