|
|
In his opening address, Hans Weiss let it be known that his book "Schwarzbuch Landwirtschaft" focussed on subsidies for Austria's Agriculture. The subsidies for Austrian agriculture would amount to ca. € 2.2 billion p.a., which would be paid to farmers by the EU, the Federal Government and the Federal States. According to Hans Weiss's calculations, 3 employees on average would finance one farmer; in case of sugar beet farmers, it would take even 6 employees. To justify these subsidies one would always hear the same arguments, i.e. that subsidies were necessary to retain small-scale Austrian agriculture. However, in reality in particular the small farmers would hardly benefit from the subsidies: one third of farmers receive on average ca. € 2,000 p.a., this amounts to ca. € 100 million resp. less than 5 % of the total subsidies. The 2,100 largest farmers (of a total of ca. 150,000 farmers) received about ca. € 75,000 p.a. on average. Apart from that, his researches had revealed that the recipients of subsidies also included the richest famers in Austria. Weiss is convinced that the rich Austrian farmers would be able to work their farms without receiving any subsidies. A lot of money is also flowing into Raiffeisen-owned farms and major Groups such as Agrana or Kraft Foods. Some of these Groups are also paid subsidies worth millions by other Member States. This practice would be questionable because these corporations certainly would not be in need of subsidies. According to Weiss, one special problem is that in particular the group who determines the rules, namely the agricultural functionaries, are especially benefitting from the subsidies. About € 100 million only flow to functionaries to benefit their enterprises. A particular characteristic of the agricultural sector would be that its representatives are constantly moaning that agricultural prices would be too low and that they would not receive enough subsidies. However, if one asked individual farmers, one would get the reply that they were fairly well off. Hence, moaning was nothing but an efficient marketing strategy. On the extinction of farmers: since 1995, on average 12 farmers per day gave up their farm. The small ones cannot afford to continue, the big ones are getting even bigger. Finally, Weiss is in favour of abandoning subsidies for foundations. Subsidies should be limited with € 25,000 p.a. and they should not only focus on the area of a farm but also on the employment of labour.
|
