Ornamental plant growers can continue to count on government support

(Photo: Pixabay)

The State Secretary highlighted at the event that the ministry maintains the priority support for the horticultural sector in the Common Agricultural Policy Strategic Plan. Thus, ornamental gardeners can count on development funds, similar to previous years, but a new form of support specially tailored to the possibilities of the sector has also been developed. The Ministry of Agriculture was pleased to experience that there was great interest in the various calls. 147 horticultural enterprises submitted applications for approximately double the announced budget of 1.6 billion forints. So far, 30 affected parties have received positive assessments, worth around 560 million forints, and in several cases the payment has already been made. Businesses could also apply for developments related to horticultural greenhouses, cold storages, and post-harvest equipment. 291 applications were received for these calls for proposals, totaling over 113 billion forints. Imre Hubai also spoke about the diverse activity structure of ornamental horticulture, with 16.7 percent of farms dealing exclusively with cut flowers last year, and 17.5 percent dealing with potted, balcony or bulbous plants. More than 2,200 people worked in the sector, almost 60 percent of them full-time. The sector’s net sales exceeded 20 billion forints. More than half of this came from the sale of nursery plants. Potted, potted balcony and bulb ornamental plants intended for planting brought in almost 7 billion forints in sales, while cut flowers and greens contributed more than 2.1 billion forints to the national economy.

The state secretary noted that the effects of climate change did not spare ornamental plant gardeners this year either

The government, thanks to the measures of the Drought Protection Operational Group, therefore made water use for irrigation free of charge, worth almost ten billion forints. However, a longer-term solution may be to encourage water retention in the landscape, the first step of which is the “Water in the Landscape!” program. Imre Hubai thanked the city of Kecel for organizing the event, as the settlement has been home to the ornamental plant growers’ event for more than three decades. This year, the festival awaits visitors at seven locations, with 200 exhibitors and vendors.

AM