Development opportunities of Hungary’s rural areas after 2013

Biró, Szabolcs – Rácz, Katalin – Székely, Erika

Keywords: Common Agricultural Policy, rural policy, disadvantaged rural areas

Rural development – which is the second pillar of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) – and the changes proposed for the forthcoming budgetary period, essentially deter-mine the development opportunities of Hungary’s rural areas. So far, according to analysts, rural development interventions have been mainly based on simply securing the available funds and there has been little incentive to generate solutions that are innovative, and which at the same time are value-added and increase employment. The interventions of the rural devel-opment pillar in the 2014-2020 European Union budgetary period will play a major role in the development of Hungary’s economically and socially disadvantaged rural areas and its agri-culture which faces competitive disadvantages. The reform of the CAP enhances the devel-opment of agriculture and rural areas with more specific and “greener” subsidies. The precise funds available to the different EU Member States are not yet known, but on the basis of the scenarios under discussion concerning changes to the mechanism of the distribution of the funds, the available financial support for Hungary from the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development would fall substantially. The main objective during the elaboration of the Hungarian rural development plan for 2014-2020 was the convergence of the rural areas, for which we need to concentrate the available financial support on priorities such as increasing the value-added based on innovation, accessing markets, cooperation and improvement of knowledge.

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