Agriculture, Financial Services, Latvia, Legislation, Markets and Companies, Real Estate

Two more agreements, on farmland purchases in Plavinas Region's Aiviekste County and Ventspils Region's Targale County, are to be signed later this week.

In total, from July 1 to August 25 the Land Fund has received offers from 217 landlords willing to sell their land plots. The greatest activity was observed during the first few days of July, when 55 applications were submitted within just three days. At the moment, the Land Fund receives two-three offers every day.

The offers are arriving from all over Latvia, but the largest number, about one-third, is from Latgale province, and the smallest – 10% – from Vidzeme.

About 190 offers have been assessed so far. 70% of the offers have been turned down, and the same will probably happen to the majority of the other offers due to terms suggested by the sellers.

According to Grauzina, the two main reasons why an offer is turned down – either the given property has not been tended for more than ten years and management of the land plot would require disproportionate investments, or the property is too small, less than 0.2 hectares in area. Unless they border some of the properties already managed by the Land Fund, maintenance and management of such plots will be too costly and therefore the fund will not buy them.

Talks on the other offers are ongoing at the moment.

The fund was established on July 1 this year to foster use of land in agricultural production by buying unused land parcels from landlords and selling or leasing them out to those who wish to use them in farming.

The fund only buys unencumbered farmland for prices that do not exceed the average market price of farmland in the given region and county.

By the end of the year, the fund plans to conclude deals worth approximately EUR 1 million. The fund has EUR 14 million in total for land purchases.