Hi Puglia he had launched a new appeal to the Ministry of Agriculture exactly one month ago: “If it does not intervene immediately, before the end of the year, by at least providing compensation for Xylella in 2020, it will be a real disaster for many olive growers in the provinces of Brindisi, Lecce and Taranto”. A non-random date, that of December 31, 2024, because it coincides with the deadline that many agricultural companies had set for the implementation and completion of scheduled investments, vainly hoping for compliance with bureaucratic deadlines.
The appeal, however, once again fell on deaf ears, to the detriment of approximately 6.000 Apulian companies waiting to receive the promised financial compensation. The request is now being reformulated in Parliament where the Vice President of the Environment Commission of the Chamber, the Five Star Movement's Patty L'Abbate (to whom the CIA appeal had been addressed as well as to all the other parliamentarians in the territory) presented an urgent question to Minister Lollobrigida.
Waiting for the first 52 million euros
“The failure to provide compensation for Xylella fastidiosa – writes the MP – penalizes Apulian agricultural companies, worsening the olive growing crisis. It is more urgent than ever to understand the reason for the delays by the Government and what measures they want to adopt to unlock the resources".
On the table, as is known, there are the 52 million euros allocated for the year 2020 and an additional 26 million euros for 2021, which have not yet been disbursed, waiting for the Ministry to provide the Puglia Region with concrete answers regarding the distribution of the allocated resources.
“The compensations – L'Abbate recalls – represent an indispensable measure to guarantee a minimum economic support to farmers affected by Xylella, in a context already aggravated by climate crises, market difficulties and excessively burdensome bureaucracy. Without those resources, a fundamental sector of Puglia will be blocked, compromising the economic and social fabric of the region, with significant repercussions on employment and on the landscape and cultural heritage. The delays in allocating funds limit the ability of the areas affected by Xylella to recover”.
Provide for further compensation
For this reason, in the question, in addition to asking why there are delays in the distribution of compensation for the years 2020 and 2021 and to urgently unblock those funds, the vice-president of the Environment Commission asked to know whether further allocations are planned for the three-year period 2022-2024, in consideration of the prolongation of the Devastating effects of Xylella on olive growing Apulian and the need to support the resilience of the sector”.
