The European Commission has found that fraudulent payments doubled last year, with most irregularities in funds going to the poorest regions.
Feeding imaginary cows and growing non-existent fruit are just some of what EU taxpayers have to foot the bill for – to the tune of over a billion euros a year.Sian Herbert from the London-based “Open Europe,” a think tank focused on improving the direction of the EU, says the union is wasting money by aiding farms.“We do need to look at where the funds are spent in terrible and wasteful ways and where there are cases of fraud,” Herbert said. “We are spending so much of the budget on subsidizing farmers – it’s not really the way to make us grow and to make our economies more competitive. We need to seriously look at our priorities, we need to invest in things which add value, like research and development,” she added.