TIRANA (Albania), June 28 (SeeNews) – Germany will offer 5 million euro ($5.8 million) through its development bank KfW to increase the capital of Albania’s Rural Credit Guarantee Fund (KCGF) in order to improve financing of projects of local farmers, German ambassador in Tirana, Susanne Schutz, said.
The fund has already supported around 1200 farmers to secure loans and finance their projects over the past three years, the ambassador said in a Facebook post earlier this week, following a meeting with farmers in the town of Lezha, in northwestern Albania.
“Much still remains to be done! Germany will continue to actively support necessary reforms in the agricultural sector,” Schutz said.
Low expenditures and structural problems such as the small size of local farms and crop fields are some of the main challenges Albania faces in the area of agriculture, the European Commission after a meeting of EU - Albania Stabilisation and Association Agreement subcommittee on agriculture and fisheries in November 2017.
($ = 0.86107 euro)