Fiasco of the “New” Technical Solution in Crete – The OPEKEPE Scandal Continues
The government’s widely publicized “new” Technical Solution in Crete has proven to be yet another fiasco. Presented as a breakthrough in transparency and promoted as a tool for reform—aimed at accurately recording livestock numbers, rationally allocating grazing land, and ensuring fair payments to farmers—it has, in practice, failed spectacularly.
Instead of correcting injustices or distortions, it created new and even more severe ones, exposing striking political incompetence:
- It did not record any substantial reduction in livestock numbers in 2025 compared to 2024.
- It allocated grazing land from Crete to regions in mainland Greece and other islands.
- It applied non-productive criteria for pasture allocation, culminating in the controversial “criterion” of animal feed purchases.
These findings stem from the response of the Independent Authority for Public Revenue (AADE) to a series of questions raised on January 20 by SYRIZA–Progressive Alliance MP Vasilis Kokkalis during the Parliamentary Committee of Inquiry. Mr. Kokkalis later incorporated these questions into a formal parliamentary inquiry addressed to the Minister of Rural Development and Food, Kostas Tsiaras.
This comes despite earlier statements by Deputy Minister Christos Kellas, who had described the amended Joint Ministerial Decision on grazing land as a “critical institutional reform for transparency, fairer allocation of subsidies, and restoring trust in the livestock sector.” In November 2025, the Ministry had also claimed that the decision “marks a transition to rules based on real productive activity, objective data, and fully documented procedures, ensuring equal terms for all livestock farmers in the country.”
Crete—one of the country’s oldest and strongest pillars of sheep and goat farming—has become a field of administrative experimentation and communication tactics. Agricultural policy, however, cannot be treated as a tax issue, grazing lands as accounting entries, or farmers as mere numbers.
The reality is stark. The “new” Technical Solution introduced by Minister Tsiaras did not deliver fair and transparent pasture allocation. Instead, it confirmed that the government operates with improvised measures and impression management rather than substantive policy. Moreover, this new approach demonstrates that the OPEKEPE scandal is ongoing.
SYRIZA–PS makes its position clear:
- The failure of a politically driven choice will not be passed onto livestock farmers.
- Agricultural policy must not remain a field for covering up governmental scandals.
- Full transparency is required regarding the criteria and algorithms of the “new” Technical Solution, along with political accountability for decisions that exacerbate farmers’ problems.
Livestock farming cannot endure further communication-driven experiments.
Farmers are not numbers in an Excel spreadsheet.
The government must provide immediate answers—and it will.
And once it does, it should step aside.
