"The digitization of agriculture is important because of the labor shortage and because it increases productivity and makes rural areas more attractive for people to stay there," state news agency Hina cited Agriculture Minister, Marija Vuckovic, as saying at a conference on new technologies in farming which opened in Osijek on Friday. Pročitaj više

Vuckovic said that after a number of technical meetings with the European Commission Croatia had received a positive response for its plan for the next programming period until 2027.

“€35 million has been ensured for the implementation of digitization and the development of a single system of knowledge that would be passed on to farmers. Of this amount, €30 million comes from EU funds,” the minister said.

“As for the National Recovery and Resilience Plan, around €6.6 million has been set aside for digital transformation, notably to develop smart agriculture, a system of traceability and efficient public services,” she added.

Vučković said that national measures would also be taken to contribute to the digitization of agriculture, highlighting the need to link together all private and public consultants, the scientific community and farmers.

She said that for digitization it was important to cover the rural areas with a broadband internet network. “In Europe, the broadband coverage rate is 86 per cent for urban areas and around 60 per cent for rural areas, whereas in Croatia this rate is 40 per cent for rural areas for now.”

Asked how the Agriculture Ministry would mitigate the rise in prices of raw materials, Vuckovic announced an advance payment of 1.75 billion kuna (€233 million) for early November, and two more measures — one to alleviate the impact of drought, for which funds will be allocated from the government budget, and the other, financed from the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development, to cushion the rise in prices of energy and other inputs.