Until the end of October it is expected that the advance payment of the Single Support from OPEKEPE to the farmers who have submitted an IACS crop declaration will be credited to the farmers’ accounts. This was announced by the Minister of Rural Development and Food, Kostas Tsiaras, in response to a Topical Question by New Democracy MP, Fotini Arambatzis.

“The deposit is usually paid in October. You know very well that one of the problems OPEKEPE had in previous years was not having a stable information system. The technical advisors changed and there were problems that related to the operation of OPEKEPE as a whole“, remarked Mr. Tsiaras and added that “there is the assurance that the advance will be paid by the end of the monthi».

According to the Minister of Rural Development and Food, a great effort is being made in the next period of time, and of course before the end of 2024, to pay the rest of the amounts related to pending cases of ecological schemes. “I don’t hide it from you that the effort made by the ministry, through the surveillance process that the Organization initiated about two months ago, is for OPEKEPE to take the required steps in the direction of digitization, the staffing of the management, the efficiency, transparency and fairness“, said the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, estimating that in the next period of time the Agency will manage to respond to its real role. He added that there should be no doubt and no concern among Greek producers regarding the smooth flow of payments.

Regarding the 87.8 million euros in 2023from the First Pillar, Kostas Tsiaras clarified that they are structured as follows:

a) Non-payment of an amount amounting to €19,249,833.77 for the Special aid for cotton, due to the non-declaration of the total cotton areas that could be declared by the cotton producers, based on the national file.

b) In the non-payment of an amount amounting to €11,040,849.23 for linked schemes for which:

  • either there was no expression of interest from the producers,
  • either the producers who applied for them did not meet the eligibility criteria,
  • or amounts for payment lower than requested as a result of administrative, on-site and other checks were identified.

c) With regard to the Basic support for sustainability that does not an amount of €43,019,879.08 has been paidand

d) Non-payment of an amount amounting to €14,129,078.00,

or due to non-activation of all the rights of the requested producers,
or as a result of the imposition of sanctions or penalties after carrying out the necessary administrative, on-site and computerized cross-checks.

In any case, Kostas Tsiaras made it clear that any corrections or additional payments that may arise after producers’ objections and after the audit is completed, will obviously be accepted and will of course be paid from this amount. At the same time, he recalled that there were similar discrepancies in previous years as well. For example, in 2018 there was a discrepancy of 83 million euros, in 2019 a discrepancy of 68 million euros, in 2020 a discrepancy of approximately 60 million euros and in 2021 of 85 million euros.

In the following link the response of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications to the Current Question of Community Aid 2023: