Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Andis Salla met on Monday with Ingrid Macdonald, reaffirming close collaboration in support of sector reforms.

Discussions focused on key priorities, including alignment with European Union standards, digitalisation of services, sustainable management of natural resources, and the empowerment of women and young people in rural communities.

Agriculture Minister Salla praised the UN’s continued support in aligning agricultural policies with EU requirements, calling the partnership important for sector development.

“Partnership with the UN remains an important pillar for sector progress and our path towards European integration,” he said.

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In his remarks at an event on rural development, Rama highlighted the need to build a new communication platform to support Albania’s EU accession process by 2030.

“This convention will not only serve as a forum for listening, but also for making concrete commitments,” said Rama, adding that preliminary recommendations from ongoing discussions will form the foundation of the event.

He emphasized the importance of shifting government focus from subsidies and tax incentives toward a more participatory development approach that mobilizes the country’s full economic potential.

“This process requires institutional cooperation, academic expertise, and a clear long-term vision for the development of Albanian agriculture,” Rama concluded.

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The Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Frida Krifca attended the event.

In her remarks, Agriculture Minister focused on the sector challenges and influence of agritourism on development and revitalization of the rural areas across the country.

“At Fustanella Farm in Petrele we discussed with agritourism entrepreneurs, representatives of big enterprises and producers who are seeking to transform their private family homes into guesthouses, already forming an amazing network of Albanian Agritourism Association,” Agriculture and Rural Development Minister said.

“We discussed challenges, success stories and strength of agritourism to revitalize villages, the locally grown produce that is giving fresh impetus to development of remote rural areas,”  she said.

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“Together with his campaign team and the DP lawmaker Oriola Pampuri, we discussed with local residents in Bastar about lack of road infrastructure, electricity and inability of local residents to reconstruct their quake-damaged houses,” Bejko said.

He said that municipal police have become just tax collectors, adding to the woes of residents by imposing fines and pressure against them.

“Local residents demand road infrastructure and electricity throughout the year, not only during the election campaign. We offer the solution under our program for all Tirana areas and not only its downtown,” Bejko said.

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The meeting in the town of Puke to launch the project was attended by local government authorities, representatives from the Shkodër Regional Agricultural Extension Agency (AREB), representatives from the Qelez, Iballe and Gjegjan women’s groups, the tourism sector, and representatives from the Regional Agricultural Directorate.

Rural Albania project aims to support and promote traditional agricultural products for the sustainable development of Albanian rural areas. The project aims to increase the productivity of family farms that operate in value chains with high potential in the disadvantaged mountainous areas of Northern Albania.

The project focuses on the neighboring and homogeneous mountainous areas of Northeastern Albania and limited production chains, aiming to maximize the socio-economic impact on the target communities. This initiative of the Albanian government will support the action of public and private actors involved in the development of the focused territories: agricultural associations, regional agencies of Agricultural Extension, small entrepreneurs, family farms and municipalities.

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The new draft law has been submitted to Assembly, which provides for some additions and changes that aim to improve the Law “On Agriculture and Rural Development”.

According to the report that accompanies this draft law, in recent years the volume of agricultural products has increased and consequently the volume of exports has increased.

The increase in production has increased competition among producers in the countries of the region and the need to find new markets to export agricultural products.

On the other hand, foreign and the domestic market, require products in quantity and quality, which is achieved by supporting farmers which are the basic element of the entire production-export chain, and this requires, among other things, the improvement of the current law. //a.i/