The Instrument for Pre-Accession Assistance in Rural Development for the programming period from 2021 to 2027 will provide investment support of over 580 million euros, of which 288 million euros is the EU's contribution, 89 million euros is national co-financing, and 203.5 million euros is the contribution of the beneficiaries themselves. The Financing Agreement between the Government of the Republic of Serbia and the European Commission was signed during September 2024 and came into force after the exchange of letters between the contracting parties on October 29, 2024. The program is intended directly for end users, namely agricultural producers - legal and natural persons, and includes the following regions: Belgrade, Vojvodina, Šumadija and Western Serbia, and Southern and Eastern Serbia. Out of the 13 measures offered by the European Commission to candidate countries for EU membership, the Republic of Serbia decided to implement seven measures within the IPARD III program. Compared to the IPARD II program and the accredited measures so far:
M1 - Investments in the physical assets of agricultural holdings;
M3 - Investments in physical assets concerning processing and marketing of agricultural and fishery products;
M7 – Farm diversification of agricultural holdings and business development;
M9 - Technical assistance,
within the IPARD III program, the following measures will also be available to beneficiaries:
Measure 4 - Agri-Environmental-Climate measures and organic production;
Measure 5 - Implementation of local rural development strategies – LEADER approach;
Measure 6 - Investments in rural public infrastructure.
The sectors covered by this Programme include milk, meat, fruit and vegetable production, grapes, eggs, and other crops (certain types of grains and industrial plants). The IPARD III program also plans to introduce new sectors, such as the fishery sector, the grain and industrial plant processing sector, and within Measure 7, in addition to the rural tourism sector, new sectors are planned: direct sale of agricultural and local products and the service sector in rural areas.
You can find more about this program at the following links:
https://uap.gov.rs/ipard-iii-podrska-ruralnom-razvoju/
https://ec.europa.eu/agriculture/enlargement/assistance/ipard_en