The farming association Asaja has denounced the fact that the regional environment and agriculture ministry has yet to officially call for farmers to submit aid requests related to the floods in January. The association believes that the delay is damaging the farming sector.
At the end of February, President Armengol announced that the government would inject an additional two million euros of aid to supplement that from the national government: Madrid's contribution was considered to have been inadequate. The regional funding was to be for producers of cereals, vegetables and potatoes, the crops that were most badly affected by the storms in January and also in December.
Two months on, and Asaja's manager, Joan Simonet, says that there has been nothing official from Fogaiba, which is the fund for grants to agriculture and fisheries. Towards the end of March, Fogaiba sent out a draft of the terms of the aid to associations such as Asaja. Submissions were made concerning this draft, but since then there has been no more communication. Simonet notes that the fields are now dry and so wonders how the ministry will actually make checks on their previously flooded condition.
The regional government's aid is supposed to cover part of the losses incurred by farmers. The specific amount set aside was to be 1.8 million euros with the possibility of increasing this. Asaja put the cost of losses for cereal crops in the Pla region of Majorca and for potatoes in Sa Pobla at over eight million euros. Of this, 6.2 million related to cereals. In the case of the early potato crop, this was almost completely ruined.