Effects of a EU Investment Subsidization Scheme on the Hungarian Agri-Food Sector

The change of the political Hungarian regime in 1990 affected deeply the economy of the country. This change made effects in each national branch, thus in the agriculture, as well. A lot of new companies dealing with agricultural production and trading has also been established in these years. Since the early '90s a lot of EU support programmes were available targeting these enterprises and providing them to strengthen their competitiveness. One of these programmes was the PHARE IPP Project for the subsidisation of the agricultural investments (between 1996-1998). The University of Debrecen was involved in the implementation, monitoring and assessment process of this project. Based on the results and suggestions of the university, new supporting elements have been built into the subsidisation programme of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development in the recent years, further enhancing the position of Hungarian farms before joining to the EU.