20 February 2012
20.02.2012 - The publication of a report on agricultural land in Kosovo last month in the name of EULUP (European Union Land Use Project) has caused reactions and perceptions of various kinds. However, our detailed analysis has detected numerous errors by its initiating author and unprofessional assessments regarding the agricultural land of our country. Such a report requires an adequate response from our institutions as well as those of the European Union. It should not be allowed that Kosovo, its citizens, and our agricultural producers become victims of such malicious reports. The authors of such reports should be immediately stopped from their wild rush.
The report in question has disturbed the local public opinion in a very improper manner and especially has frightened the citizens, along with the producers in Kosovo from the agriculture, livestock, and other food production sectors, whose raw materials mostly depend on the quality of the land and water of Kosovo used for their semi-finished and finished food products.
The Kosovo Environmental Protection Agency (KEPA) throughout this entire time has closely and thoroughly studied and analyzed this report since the first day of its publication. In parallel, it has carefully observed several one-sided and unprofessional interpretations from various parties, including some local and regional media. Likewise, for this purpose, we have also utilized comparisons with analyses conducted by us and other Kosovar and foreign PhD researchers in this sector.
We are fully aware of the manner in which this report was prepared up to its publication and the way it has been presented to the local, regional, and European public opinion, which is quite negative as such. It is the duty and obligation of AMMK and all relevant local factors to provide their opinion and assessment, above all professionally, to make the necessary clarifications and to inform the local public opinion first, and then the regional and wider one, about the state and quality of agricultural land in Kosovo. Likewise, it is our ethical and professional obligation to take care of Kosovo's agricultural land, because the future of the economy and the health of our citizens depends on local products, as well as imported ones at the same time.
Kosovo's agricultural land does not need in any way an approach like the one taken by this unserious, unscientific, and very shallow report. Its authors even seem ridiculous, and at the same time very malicious.
The analysis of the experts from AMMK and the Ministry of Environment states that this report has its own mistakes related to the methodology used, and in it no criteria, that is, no standards, were respected during the research process. Nowhere in this report are the methods and materials used during the analyses mentioned. Neither local nor European Union standards were respected.
Our study and analysis of this publication, which is nothing other than a preliminary and very incomplete report, served to the local public in the name of EULUP, obliges us at the same time to openly tell the local opinion, our farmers, and other producers of Kosovo not to be alarmed by the extremely unserious, early, and unmeasured conclusions. Some of the findings and assessments of our experts regarding this unserious and tendentious publication state that; a) this report is full of conclusions that contradict each other. This report is also in complete contradiction with the data held by AMMK and the Ministry of Environment regarding the possible areas of agricultural land pollution.
b) The drafters of this report, on the very first page of the summary, reveal its final purpose, since they seek to convince the local opinion, the institutions of Kosovo, and European and international donors of a multi-year project of analyses. Like other recommendations within this preliminary report, this recommendation is misplaced from the start; it is an unfounded alarm at the beginning of its first pages. This recommendation is unserious and highly biased;
c) the interpretation and commenting on the data of this preliminary report by its initial drafters have numerous deficiencies and are not substantiated. In no commentary on the report’s results is there justification for the conclusions and interpretations of so-called results regarding the pollution of agricultural land.
Our analysis and findings for this report do not stop there and they are numerous. They lead us to state with full conviction that this report and its authors mercilessly presume that the agricultural land of Kosovo is polluted. AMMK is in a position to prove and refute them at any moment.
The analyses and research, namely other reports and studies on the condition of agricultural land in our country, must be fully complete and must be conducted in accordance with all the rules of the current domestic legislation and fully in line with the criteria and standards of the European Union, of which our citizens and Kosovo are determined to become members.
The effect of this unserious and unprofessional report has already begun to disturb all of us. Our agricultural producers are concerned, as well as regional and broader buyers of our products. Meanwhile, AMMK is motivated like never before for an action plan to protect the image of agricultural land and local products. These days, AMMK is preparing a cooperation platform for the development of a strategy and partnership with agricultural producers to safeguard the agricultural land of Kosovo and to promote its quality, and all of this will serve to promote the quality of our agricultural products both within and beyond the borders of Kosovo.
At the same time, we must be correct and farsighted. The economic development and social well-being of the citizens of Kosovo require more precise and deeper work from all aspects and from all local factors, from our central institutions, municipal ones, to our agricultural producers.
Since its founding, the AMMK and other structures of Kosovo institutions, despite difficulties of all kinds and from all possible sides, have worked and are continuously working to create the best possible environment in Kosovo, to establish conditions for a better future so that our local food products, of all types, are of the highest quality and are best placed in the domestic and foreign market.
The land, soil, and water of Kosovo are extraordinary assets for the citizens of our country, and they must be managed in the best possible way so that they can be utilized as rationally as possible. All this is so that our food products are of the highest quality and, at the same time, as competitive as possible, facing the fierce floods of imports from all directions. Our products are confronted with a flood of improper imports, which in some cases do not even comply with the European Union standards for fair competition, and sometimes not even in terms of quality.
At the same time. We say with full responsibility that there is no room for pleasure. And there shouldn't be. We are still in the phase of preparing the full legal infrastructure based on European Union standards, so that we can improve the environment in Kosovo as best and as dignified as possible and preserve Kosovo's nature, land, soil, and water.
But waiting for the entire legal infrastructure will not leave us idle in any way. The land of Kosovo needs to be supported. The damage caused by human factors in Kosovo and the region must be permanently remedied only through the implementation of laws, both existing ones and new ones awaiting adoption based on EU standards.
Therefore, esteemed citizens and agricultural producers, under no circumstances should we be self-satisfied, and above all, we must not allow others to crudely and brutally tarnish the agricultural land of our country, as the authors of the aforementioned report have attempted.
To be fair, it must be accepted that this report highlights some high levels of certain chemical elements (Ni, Cr, As, etc.) in the soil, which are geologically linked elements and not the result of human activity. This fact proves that the agricultural lands of Kosovo are not polluted as was propagandized.
What is the purpose behind this malicious report?
That all of us; institutions and citizens, together must work to preserve as much as possible the quality of the soil, land, and water of our country, and to produce as much food as possible to meet the needs of both the domestic and foreign markets.
We must and can stand up for our agricultural land even against such reports/publications, like the most recent one in question, published in the name of EULUP and with the taxpayer money of the EU. We must not allow manipulations regarding the truth about our agricultural land. We must fight these dark tendencies. At the same time, AMMK invites the European Commission, the Council of EU Ministers, and other Western and international partners to work together and permanently in protecting Kosovo's nature and environment, to further improve the quality of agricultural land, and to assist, in all legal ways, agricultural producers in further increasing the quality of our food products.
Also, AMMK will not hesitate in any way or at any time to resist and even to expose and fight any attempts at manipulation, whether intentional or unintentional, that could aim to harm and, above all, tarnish the hard work of our tireless agricultural producers.
The report published in the name of EULUP has been entirely misused even for Western representatives in Kosovo. As such, it does not help our local objectives and efforts to increase capacities and expand Kosovo's production opportunities in the agriculture and livestock sector.
However, we do not want to believe that this report is deliberate and serves any effort to suffocate and damage the image of our food products. Otherwise, our authorities should take this seriously to clarify any possible hidden intentions behind this report.
AMMK considers that research should be conducted on the tendency of multiple findings that are made arbitrarily, in a completely unmeasured and unprofessional manner, because this report mercilessly strikes the most vital and strategic part of our economy.
The necessary role of the EU in this case:
The legal institutions of Kosovo as well as the European Union and its mission (EULEX) should be ready to clarify the truth regarding this preliminary and completely unprofessional, biased, and unscrupulous report.
It must be uncovered and clarified fully, legally, the truth about whether this report has a hidden agenda against the agricultural sector in Kosovo and its future.
At the same time, it must be said that the truth about agricultural land requires scientific research and detailed and regular observations. Until now, AMMK has done its best in this regard, and our findings and analyses strongly contradict the unscrupulous and obscure speculations of the report published in the name of EULUP.
The future of Kosovo's economy already needs the potentials of Kosovo's land to be revealed, in order to help the country's economic recovery and the social welfare of our citizens, and to compete honorably with our products from this sector with the countries of the region and beyond against the aggressive imports that have been established in Kosovo.