While farmers are looking for money, will the wage bill at the Ministry of Agriculture grow significantly?
When discussing the proposals for the 2026 budget, a group of MEPs addressed the Seimas Committee on Rural Affairs with a proposal to allocate additional funds to the Ministry of Agriculture for salary increases. The amount requested would double between 2026 and 2028.
When this information was announced by Bronis Ropė, the chairman of the Seimas CRC, the Minister of Agriculture Andrius Palionis smilingly retorted that the Ministry of Agriculture had not asked for the extra money.
"It is not the ministry that is asking. It is the Members of Parliament who are asking. We are grateful to them for that," said Mr Palionis, who just 20 minutes before the debate on this issue had announced that agriculture, which is considered a strategic sector of the economy, would unfortunately see a reduction in funding next year.
It was said that low salaries make it difficult to attract qualified specialists to the Ministry of Agriculture, which is why it is proposed to increase the wage bill by €516,000 next year, €816,000 in 2027 and €816,000 in 2028, rising to €1.817 million in 2028.When asked whether the Agriculture Minister could manage with this kind of money, Palionis sarcastically joked about whether the question was about "too much or too little", adding that the ministry had the lowest salaries of any government ministry (the average is €1,600).
The parliamentary CRC approved the proposal to increase the ministry's salaries.
