The enemy in one's own country

Since it became known that EU subsidies for Bulgaria are to be cut, the farmers directly affected by the move have been organising protests. But according to the daily Dnevnik it is not those in Brussels who are to blame: "The real reason behind the farmers' strikes is that for years the work of the ministry of agriculture has been unsatisfactory. Unlike Romanian farmers, for example, who receive funding on the basis of how many livestock they have registered, the Bulgarians receive none because the country has no system for recording the information. This also puts grain producers at a disadvantage, who a year after the promised date have still not received compensation for the droughts in 2007. But farmers working in the SAPARD projects are even worse off and this is owing to the lack of supervision by the authorities [regarding the administration of funding]."

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