Summary of newspapers of the previous day – 7.12.2011

Amendment of seed act aims at final approval

The parliament released in the final reading an amendment of seed act which concerns above all seeds determined for protection of natural environment. It is dealt with seed used predominantly in national parks or protected landscape areas and its placing on the market. The parliamentary Agricultural Committee suggested representatives to approve the amendment without comments. It is dealt mainly with seeds of meadow flowers and plants from mountain meadows. The amendment introduces permissions which the Central Institute for Supervising and Testing in Agriculture will issue tradesmen with this seed. An interested person in this permission will have to inform the institute about an amount of seed for which it asks for the permission and about an acreage and placement of planned localities of seed harvesting.

EU citizens will obviously get more easily to state agricultural land

The parliament released in the final reading an government amendment about sale of state agricultural and forest land. The amendment will enable sale of this land to citizens of the EU, Norway, Switzerland, and Island. The bill is connected with an approved amendment of foreign currency law which cancelled a legal limitation of purchase of agricultural land for foreigners. The amendment is about to secure a sale of agricultural parcels to farmers who have already manage there. A condition will be so that the field acreage would amount at least to ten hectares and farmers would manage on it for at least 36 months. The aim of this proposal according to the government is also to unify conditions for transfers of agricultural land to agricultural entrepreneurs and prevent preferential acquisition of land by persons who do not operate agricultural production.

KLASA has its other holders

Already eight ceremonial dispensing of the mark of quality foods KLASA has took place in Prague Žofín. The deputy minister of agriculture Tomáš Šimčík together with a director of the State Agricultural and Intervention Fund Oldřich Černoch handed over ceremonially KLASA certificates to producers of quality foods on the 6th December. This year, eleven producers with thirty eight products in total obtained them. A part of the whole even was also an afternoon workshop in framework of which representatives of the Food Chamber of the CR met with the director of SZIF and the Minister of Agriculture Petr Bendl

Egg production will decrease owing to new cages by as much as fifth

After the New Year, a temporary decrease in egg production of inland commercial eggs by as much as a fifth can be expected. It will happen owing to an investment in the amount of 1.6 to two milliard crowns from the side of industrial laying hen breeders in new, for poultry more comfortable cages. The European Union ordered their compulsory introduction from the 1st January, even if poultry breeders did not like this decision much. “The production will decrease in the Czech Republic mainly in the first month of 2012 roughly by a fifth”, a chairwoman of the Czech-Moravian Poultry-Breeding Union Dagmar Tůmová said to the daily E15. The reason is that breeders will finish reconstruction of capacities for breeding hens.