ROMANIAN SUBSISTENCE FARMS - HOPE OF FUTURE'S AGRICULTURE

Due to the last two changes within European Union in 2004 and 2007 many farms joined to this unity, most of these being subsistence farms (SF) or semi subsistence farms (SFF). This level of integration upon markets is low and their efficiency was put under question. On the other hand they are in the rural area often in the most vulnerable and disadvantaged regions. They help to a good function of the rural communities and provide important social, cultural and environmental goods. As a consequence, current situation and the effects of structural changes in terms of their survival or extinction have a great importance upon rural area within European Union. Secondly, similar issues exist in other member states as well affecting small farms which might be or not subsistence farms but they play an important role for local communities, agro-environment and cultural heritage. Understanding what subsistence farms mean leads to other issues such as: farm size, farming methods, poverty and deprivation in rural areas, etc. That is why, these kind of farms have different ways of development and have even different roles within European Union. On this base, this paper tries to underline briefly the main information regarding small farms the or individual ones as they are called in some new member states.