The farmers in the country that don’t have access to irrigation are faced with lots of problems. The primary and secondary network that should bring the water to the farmer’s land is old and needs rehabilitation, completely destroyed or non-existent. Therefore, the farmers are left to find own solutions, by digging out wells, providing pipes and installing pumps. This, however, increases their expenses, which influences the earnings that they can achieve. The profits are anyhow not substantial, as the farmers usually have bellow 1 ha of land. There are also places where water can’t be brought to the land at all. The farmers there are leaving agriculture all together, or plant crops that don’t require lot of water. This situation doesn’t influence only the farmers, but has negative impact on the overall economic development and rural sustainability. It doesn’t help towards fighting poverty and migration towards the cities inside and outside the country where jobs can be found, needed to secure covering the existential needs for the farmers and their families.

The European Union together with the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Water Economy has started this project in order to support the farmers that have small land, as they are mostly influenced by the lack of irrigation systems. The locations will be chosen taking in consideration overcoming the regional disparities, the scale of the benefit to be achieved for the local community and other defined criteria. By providing the projects, including tendering documentation, for rehabilitation or construction of new systems, the needed preparatory work will be done. A new project financed by the European Union though IPA will than proceed to construction of those irrigation systems. This will contribute to sustainable and inclusive economic, social and territorial development of the country.