Draft law: Foreigners allowed to buy up to 50 hectares of arable land in Romania

Romania’s Agriculture Ministry has drafted the law that regulates the purchase of agricultural land by foreigners. The law limits the maximum surface of land that can be bought by foreign investors to 50 hectares. The new law will apply only after the cadastral survey process will be completed, said the agriculture minister Achim Irimescu. He said that it’s important to outline clear objectives to avoid the situation of Bulgaria, which came up with such a law some years ago, but then had to pull it back, because it failed to respect European norms. Romania has 14 million hectares of agricultural land, 3.8 million hectares of which is organized in farms. The total arable land surface is 9.3 million hectares, with only 3 million hectares being recorded in the cadastral plan, said Irimescu. Romania could restrict land purchase by foreigners editor@romania-insider.com