New guidelines on the valuation of agricultural land will put farmers' minds at rest, Agriculture Minister Anton Refalo said on Wednesday.
Speaking at Ġnien l-Għarusa in Mosta, Refalo explained that new subsidiary legislation will help value agricultural plots so that farmers who rent their land can do so at a “fair and appropriate price”.
Currently, for agricultural land to be financially assessed, members of the Rural Leases Control Board will examine the land and give their evaluations to the board’s chairman who then passes the final judgement.
The new valuation of land will be based on two approaches, Agriculture Director Marco Dimech explained.
The first is the base value of the land which is a national value and is determined by the agriculture industry’s income. Effectively, the base value of agricultural land is proportional to the amount of money it earns and will change accordingly.
This figure will be revised and published every five years in the Government Gazette and will only see a maximum increase of 1.5 per cent, Dimech said.
Once the land’s base value is determined, experts will use several other factors to determine each individual plot’s final financial number such as accessibility, water access, type and depth of soil and the presence of buildings, amongst others.
Dimech emphasised that the legislation will value land that is owned by the private sector and functions under Chapter 199 – the Agricultural Leases (Reletting) Act. This does not apply to government-owned land, he said.
The legislation will strive to achieve a balance between landowners and operators, while looking towards a sustainable farming future as 7,500 farmers currently work within the industry, he said, putting their "minds at rest".
"We have carefully and seriously studied the issue, and I am aware that the reform is ambitious and deep, but it is also balanced and based on proportionality. But above all, it is urgent and necessary," Refalo said.
The minister did not say when the subsidiary legislature will come into effect.