Albanian agriculture has entered the third year of suspension of IPARD III funds by the European Union due to suspicions of corruption. 

Since July 2023, when the European Commission stopped reimbursements for IPARD II and suspended IPARD III, the Albanian government has warned several times of the imminent return of funding. 

Recently, the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Andis Salla, stated that the funds will be opened within the first 6 months of the year.

“We have done our duties, what was asked of us by the European Union. We are on March 9 (Brussels), to continue the further steps so that we have IPARD III within the first 6 months,”  said Salla.

But is there an official decision from the European Commission confirming this deadline?

The Albanian government has stated several times that IPARD funds will be reopened “soon” or within a certain deadline. In each previous case, the European Commission has clarified that the procedure was still in progress and that there was no set date.

Even today, after Minister Salla’s statement, there is no public confirmation from the European Commission about the opening of IPARD III within the first 6 months or about the disbursement of millions of euros this year. 

What is known so far?

The European Commission has repeatedly reiterated that the resumption of funds for Albanian agriculture depends on the fulfillment of corrective measures and the guarantee of the protection of the EU’s financial interests. Meanwhile, the criminal investigation in Albania, handled by SPAK, has been ongoing for years without concrete results.

The IPARD III program provides around 146 million euros for Albanian agriculture. But its suspension is a formal decision of the European Commission and only another formal decision can lift it.

So far, there has been no official announcement from Brussels that:

• confirms the completion of the procedure,
• announces the lifting of the suspension,
• or the final signing of the Financing Agreement.

Repeated promises

This is not the first time that Albanian authorities have announced a deadline for the opening of IPARD III.

In July 2023, the then Minister of Agriculture, Frida Krifca, described the suspension as a “normal administrative procedure,” suggesting that similar cases had occurred in other EU countries. But the European Commission responded to Faktoje.al that “there have been no similar cases,” describing the measure against Albania as unprecedented.

In May 2024, Deputy Minister of Agriculture Dhimitër Kote stated that IPARD III would be operational in 2025. This statement was also denied by the European Commission, which clarified that the procedure was still ongoing and there was no date for the return of the funds. The EC’s spokesperson for trade and agriculture, Olof Gill, emphasized that the suspension of reimbursements remained in force until further notice.

In 2025, Prime Minister Edi Rama declared that it was only about “irregularities” and not about suspicions of corruption. But official documents and responses from the EC have emphasized that the suspension was based on information obtained in the framework of an OLAF investigation, not simply on routine audits.

Conclusion

The IPARD agricultural support programme   provides grants to support the agricultural sector for all countries in the process of accession to the European Union. Albania is one of the five countries benefiting from grant support. Through the IPARD II programme, which was implemented between 2014 and 2020, Albania received over 71 million euros in funding. And as the country was waiting to start supporting agriculture through IPARD III with 146 million euros in grants, the European Commission decided to suspend it based on suspicions of corruption. 

Without an official decision from the European Commission, statements on the release of IPARD III funds remain one-sided political promises.

Until Brussels officially announces the lifting of the suspension, any deadline announced by the Albanian government for the return of funds is unconfirmed and, based on the precedents of recent years, risks remaining mere propaganda.