Mazón Showers Alicante's Countryside with Aid

This Tuesday, the Generalitat will approve an extraordinary direct aid plan endowed with 17 million euros to urgently and extraordinarily alleviate the drought affecting the entire dry farming sector and all livestock farming in the Valencian Community, as announced by President Carlos Mazón. Nearly six thousand farmers and livestock breeders in the province of Alicante will benefit from this initiative.

These are "direct aids without bureaucratic procedures or applications, to bolster, out of justice, necessity, and priority, the beleaguered accounts of our farmers and livestock breeders." The Department of Agriculture, Water, Livestock, and Fisheries has data on most of those affected, so the transfer will be made directly to the beneficiaries.

This order is aimed at extensive and semi-extensive cattle, sheep, and goat farming in the Valencian Community, as well as dryland farming operations.

Specifically, out of the 17 million euros, two million are allocated to livestock farming and 15 million to dryland agriculture. This could benefit up to 500 livestock breeders, 29,500 farmers, and cover 175,000 hectares of crops. By province, the number of beneficiaries would reach 5,973 in Alicante.

On average, each livestock operation will receive 4,000 euros based on the number of heads of cattle, and dryland farmers can receive up to 4,500 euros. The aid will cover olive plantations, dryland grapevines, almond trees, cereals, pomegranates, cherries, and carob trees; as well as all extensive cattle, sheep, and goat farming.

Additionally, the President of the Generalitat recalled the high rate of agricultural land abandonment in the Valencian Community. In this regard, he highlighted the policies implemented by the Consell to promote generational renewal by eliminating inheritance and donation taxes and expressed the Generalitat's intention to "continue advancing in this direction."

Furthermore, Carlos Mazón warned that with the loss of agricultural land in the Community "not only does the Mediterranean diet disappear but we also lose firebreaks that are the best preventive help in firefighting."

This initiative adds to other actions that the Generalitat is carrying out to ensure the competitiveness of agri-food activities in the Valencian Community. These include creating the Water Table of the Valencian Community, allocating 35 million euros for agricultural insurance subscriptions, supplying 12 million liters of water to 44 municipalities and more than 100 livestock operations, or providing 12.6 million euros to Acequia Real del Júcar for irrigation modernization, among others.