of the regulatory bottlenecks that have to be addressed not only for the sake of the “Candidate” status but also for the sake of making the Albanian agriculture more competitive. Meanwhile Albania has to make sig nificant adjustments in order to meet EU standards and to adopt and implement the acquis communautaire. In the field of common agricultural policy (CAP), this means, for example, harmonizing legisla tion in the areas of food safety, veterinary, phytosanitary, the free movement of ani mals and agricultural products, adminis tration and control of payments, etc. The experience of the new member states has shown that particular effort and invest ment will be needed to meet the acquis in agriculture. Various EU funded proj ects (mainly in the context of IPA) are now helping Albania prepare for acces sion, while familiarizing the authorities and other relevant organizations with the methods used to implement EU support measures. The Albanian agricultural legislation is only partly harmonized with the acquis as yet. While relatively good progress has been made as regards food security and veterinary legislation, the harmonization of the legislation regarding Common Mar ket Organizations is still lagging behind. However, Albania does not expect any problems in the coming years in adopt ing the remaining acquis communautaire and it will be able to implement in full the acquis communautaire only upon its accession to the EU. The Ministry of Agriculture is ex pected to revise the agriculture and ru ral development strategies and finalize the rural development plan which will provide the basis for adoption of policy measures in agriculture and rural devel opment. The legislation in the field of food safety is actually partly harmonized with the acquis and a National Food Au thority has been established, as a key in stitution responsible to control the food safety situation in the country. The legis lation in this field is mainly based on the “Food Law”, “Veterinary Law”, “Plant Protection Law” and other legislation in related areas.
As a further achievement in aligning with EU structure and institutional de velopment, public extension (advisory) services in Albania are established and function in all regions and administra tive levels of the country At the central level, the extension service is under the Directorate of Extension Service, Science and Agricultural Information (DESSI) in the MAFCP, which is re sponsible for strategy formulation, and management and organization of this service at the national scale16. The five Agricultural Technology Transfer Centres (ATTC) are also part of central structure. Their main tasks are as follows: introduc ing new methods, inputs and technological packages; conducting on farm research and testing based on problems raised by farm ers in respective regions; training techni cal expertise to extension service staff and farmers; demonstration of new technolo gies of animal breeding; and preparing and publishing extension materials intended to specialists and farmers. The current level of efficiency of service organizations remains low and their capacities need significant improvement. Only a small number of farmers refer to the extension services for information and advice on seeds, crops, pest control, livestock breeding and dif ficult access to finance, which hampers the farm modernization and growth.
B. Main trends and issues relating to FDI in agriculture in other transition economies and Albania Agriculture is a specific area for FDI, the peculiarities of which need attention when formulating related policies in Al bania. While foreign land ownership is restricted in some countries, in others the role of agricultural FDI is fairly controver sial. The size of FDI in agriculture is usu ally small but it may have important im pacts, especially in developing economies (UNCTAD, WIR09). 16 There are also three Regional Extension Coordinators as part of the Ministry's Extension Section responsible for coordinating and monitoring the district level extension plans, training programs and on-farm-research activities within their regions.
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