On Monday 18 December, the European Commission announced that it had authorised a French aid scheme worth €420 million to encourage investment in agricultural hydraulic infrastructure.
Under the scheme, aid will take the form of direct grants, repayable advances and guarantees.
The aid scheme will be open to agricultural holdings, collective structures for grouping farmers, cooperatives for the use of agricultural equipment, single irrigation bodies, owners’ associations, semi-public mixed economy companies, public establishments and local authorities.
The European Commission specifies that the final beneficiaries of the measure will be farmers using the facilities built.
The Commission found that the measure complied with the European rules on state aid, in particular the guidelines for State aid in the agriculture and forestry sectors and in rural areas, and with Article 107(3)(c) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the EU, which allows aid to facilitate the development of certain economic activities or of certain economic areas to be authorised under certain conditions.
The scheme will run until 31 December 2029. (Original version in French by Émilie Vanderhulst)