La Unió Llauradora has expressed its criticism regarding the Ministry of Agriculture's decision to exclude 140 municipal applications for aid intended for the improvement of rural roads for the year 2026. According to the agricultural organization, only 50 localities have secured these financial supports, despite the amount requested by the municipalities exceeding the available allocation for the call, which was set at 4 million euros.
The resolution published in the Official Gazette of the Generalitat Valenciana (DOGV) on July 16 confirms that the sum of the requests surpasses the allocated budget. The evaluation committee has applied the objective criteria established in the regulatory bases to select the beneficiary proposals. Additionally, 16 applications were declared inadmissible for reasons such as having been beneficiaries in previous calls, presenting non-subsidizable actions, duplication, or exceeding investment limits. There are also 32 withdrawn files, mostly due to failure to meet rectification requirements.
La Unió considers this call important, as its purpose is to finance permanent improvement works on the surface of public rural roads. These infrastructures are deemed strategic for ensuring access to agricultural holdings and facilitating agricultural activity in rural areas. The general secretary of La Unió, Carles Peris, has pointed out that the volume of applications highlights the neglect of agricultural infrastructure and that the lack of resources hinders agricultural activity, negatively impacting machinery, vehicles, and people's safety.
The cutoff line for awarding aid has been established with a score of four points and a rurality coefficient of 0.6242. In the province of Alicante, seven municipalities have been beneficiaries, while 32 have been excluded. In Castellón, 23 localities will receive aid and 31 will not. Regarding the province of Valencia, 20 municipalities have been beneficiaries and 77 have been denied.
