Welcoming YPARD representative for Moldova - Sergiu Mihailov!

YPARD welcomes YPARD representative for Moldova: Sergiu Mihailov

Sergiu Mihailov became a YPARD member in 2012 together with other young professionals from the agricultural field, in Moldova. He believes that through a joint cooperation between private farmers, civil society (NGO-s), research institutions and other key actors from the entire agricultural system, it is possible to achieve a sustainable development of the Moldovan agricultural sector and thus achieve an improvement of the living conditions of the people from the rural areas of Moldova. He thinks that YPARD can be a strong mechanism towards this.

From 2012, Sergiu is also a member of the Moldova National Platform of Eastern Partnership. He is involved in the working group "2" – "Economic integration, convergence with EU policies", particularly in the subgroup (panel) focusing on Agriculture and Rural Development.

After a master in "Agriculture Economy and European Integration" at the University of Agricultural Sciences and Veterinary Medicine Ia?i, Romania, Sergiu started his activities in the agricultural field in 2006 when he joined the NGO "Pro Cooperare Regionala" in the position of project manager. Together with an enthusiastic group, they have established the fundament of this NGO and its activities focused on agriculture and rural development of poor communities.

Their mission is to contribute to the improvement of social and economic conditions in the rural areas of North part of Moldova by supporting small and medium farmers and assisting poor rural communities to a sustainable development. The activities are oriented on improving private farmers' knowledge and increasing productivities and incomes, with special focus on youth .

At present Sergiu is managing this NGO from the position of executive director and during 7 years, a close collaboration was established with researchers and experts in the agricultural field from different institutions such as: Research Institute of Field Crops "Selectia", Institute of Biotechnology in Animal Husbandry and Veterinary Medicine, Faculty of Agro-Ecology of Balti State University etc…

A project called "Farmer School for Sustainable Agriculture" is currently providing vocational training and advisory service in sustainable agriculture for the medium sized, market oriented farms. It will offer them know-how about more balanced, long term oriented farming systems in order to protect soil, nature and people working in agriculture.

Two locally state organizations: the Faculty of Agro-Ecology of Balti State University and the Research Institute of Field Crops "Selectia" from Balti are supporting ProCoRe’s initiative and a close cooperation with young researchers from this institutions is established.

"The agricultural sector is facing several challenges: declining cultivated area due to migration abroad, declining agricultural productivity due to natural resource degradation, insufficient knowledge of farmers and increasing competition from international markets. Solutions in solving these challenges are to improve agricultural production systems and the marketing along the entire value chain." Sergiu says.

"The dominating concept of agriculture in Moldova is intensification and specialisation (monoculture) by using more and more inputs which led to many negative ecologic and social consequences. This industrial model of agriculture didn't allow making agriculture more sustainable and the farmers became highly dependent. That’s why farmers should look for alternative ways of agricultural production. The goal is to increase the productivity but in the same time to reverse the current situation with high degradation and pollution of natural resources." he adds.

Youth has a key role to play towards this purpose!

Warm welcome to Sergiu as YPARD Moldova representative! If you are from Moldova or work in this country, and want to get involved in YPARD Moldova activities, please contact Sergiu at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .