agriculture and marketing

The assessment was implemented in the framework of the agribusiness component of the Moldova Investment Climate Reform Project financed by the World Bank Group. This component aimed at enhancing the market competitiveness of Moldova’s agro-food products through a set of targeted interventions in areas of agricultural inputs, food safety, competition policy and export facilitation.

The Assessment of the regulatory framework of in agricultural input markets was initiated to provide the ground for interventions to reduce administrative burden of private sector players in these markets as well as accelerate farmers’ access to modern agricultural inputs. Three groups of inputs were selected for the assessment: seeds and seedlings, fertilizers and pesticides, as well as agricultural machinery and equipment.

The following tasks were implemented:

Task 1. Detailed mapping of the regulatory framework of the selected markets including all legal acts, procedures, controls, permissive documents. The mapping covered the stages of business registration, local production, import, storage, handing and sale on the domestic market

Task 2. Reality check to identify gaps between “law” and “praxis” through focused interviews with private sector to cross check the accuracy of the collected legal information and understand the processes involved in the practical application of the regulatory requirements, as well as identify constraints encountered by the private sector

Task 3. Regional price analysis for selected products of the three groups of inputs comparing the prices of selected inputs in Moldova with Ukraine and Romania.

Task 4. A very detailed comparison with the relevant regulatory framework of EU to identify gaps and inefficiencies in the domestic framework

Task 5. Proposals regarding streamlining of Moldova’s regulations in line with the best EU praxis and relevant discussions with contracting authority, representatives of public and private sector

Tasks 6. Presentation of findings and recommendations through the extensive report and workshop addressed to the representative of public and private sector.