The census of Serbian agriculture will be conducted from October 1 to December 15 this year, said the director of the Republic Institute of Statistics (RSO), Miladin Kovacevic.

"The preliminary results will be published no later than January 31, 2024, and the final results, subsequently, by the end of 2025," he said at the press conference.

He stated that the financing of the census is provided by the budget of Serbia, but also by the pre-accession funds of the EU IPA 2018. As he pointed out, a total of 4.000 people will participate in the census, of which 3.000 are enumerators, and about 680.000 households, legal entities and entrepreneurs who are engaged in agricultural production will be covered.

"The list provides a comprehensive, internationally comparable overview of the structural characteristics of national agriculture, as well as a basis for creating a sustainable agricultural policy," Kovacevic said.

The head of the Cooperation Department of the EU Delegation in Serbia, Nikola Bertolini, said that the EU provided 20 million euros for the agricultural census. He stated that this census is important for the entire economy of Serbia. The State Secretary of the Ministry of Agriculture, Milica Djurdjevic specified that the census will cover agricultural holdings, family agricultural farms, as well as owners of agricultural farms who are registered in the register of agricultural farms.

"According to the data of the Register of Agricultural Farms, managed by the Directorate for Agrarian Payments of the Ministry of Agriculture, 466.000 farms are currently registered, of which 462.000 are family farms," ​​she said. She added that the largest number of owners of agricultural holdings are older than 70 years, while the total reported arable area is about 2,6 million hectares, H1 reported.