Last week, July 15th 2020, Ceres Management Services organized, under the auspices of the AHK Romanian-German Chamber of Commerce and Industry, an event addressed to the Romanian agribusiness sector in which the prospects for the development of regional agricultural HUBs in Romania were discussed, both as opportunities as well as challenges during and particularly after the COVID-19 pandemic.
The current global outbreak of COVID-19 has disrupted agricultural and food systems around the world. In order to avoid interruptions in the food supply and production chain, it is important for Romania to keep the food supply chains operational, developing in this sense national infrastructures capable of stimulating domestic production and perfectly interconnected with the sales market.
Present at this debate, Mr. Nichita-Adrian Oros, Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, introduced the main strategic directions assumed by Romania in the national economic recovery plan on agriculture sector, reiterating the importance of developing regional capacities for collection, storage, packaging and distribution of agri-food products in the domestic market and even regional-international ones. In this sense, the Ministry develops during this period a strategy aligned in supporting and promoting multiple forms of association that can lead to the realization of eight regional centers, agribusiness HUB, the position of the government being rather of facilitator and not main actor in the operational management and implementation.
Ceres Management Services, through the voice of its development director Mr. Liviu Becheanu, introduced to the audience the project initiated in Covasna County as a concrete example of implementing in Romania an agribusiness HUB concept that can coagulate together both local agri-food producers, distributors and the local market, launching the opportunity to collaborate with interested structures and having specific expertise in operational management for such infrastructures.
The intervention of Mr. Sebastian Metz, Executive Director of AHK Romania, was focused on the interest of companies with German capital which expressed their interest to expand and intensify their presence in the Romanian agricultural field for a so called practical contribution in order to increase sectorial productivity and supporting similar agribusiness investments where the involvement of all actors within the production, distribution and sales chain is crucial. The event capitalized the high quality of the interventions from the participants, mentioning here with special appreciation:
Mr. George Badescu – Executive Director of the Association of Romania’s Large Retailers,
Mr. Gheorghe Vlad – President of the Romanian Farmers Confederation,
Ms. Ioana Popp – Director of KPMG Romania,
Mr. Florian Ciolacu – Executive Director of the Romanian Farmers Club,
Mr. Cezar Gheorghe – Head of Trading at Agricover and
Mr. Mircea Nicolae Cotoros Managing Director at PAS, moderator of the event and contributor with specific details on the agribusiness market analysis performed in Transylvania region.