Up to expiry of the deadline, citizens submitted more than 100,000 applications for purchase of courtyard lots at price of EUR 1 per square meter to the Property and Legal Affairs Office. During the last day of the envisaged deadline alone, 14,000 applications were submitted by citizens for privatization of land, Ministry of Finance announced today.p/>
 
Ministry of Finance points out that this is not the final number of submitted applications, since applications sent by mail were still arriving to the regional offices, which are to be taken into account, assessing the project for purchase of courtyard lots at the price of EUR 1 per square meter as a successful one.
 
Most interest in purchasing courtyard lots was shown in Bitola. Almost 10,000 applications were submitted in this municipality since the beginning of the implementation of this measure in September 2009 until the expiry of the deadline, and 1,611 applications were submitted оn the last day alone. 7,835 applications were submitted in Prilep. More than 5,000 applications for purchase of courtyard lots were submitted in Kisela Voda municipality (6,836), followed by Stip municipality (5,783), Karpos municipality (5,673), Veles municipality (5,235) and Kumanovo municipality (5,108). Less than 1,000 applications were submitted in the following municipalities: Demir Hisar (148), Kriva Palanka (530), Kratovo (739) and Makedonski Brod (752).
 
As stated in the press release from the Ministry of Finance, in addition to the great interest by the citizens in purchasing their courtyard lots at the price of EUR 1, significant interest was also shown by companies which used the possibility for 30% discount for privatization of the land they use. Since March 2010, i.e. since the beginning of the implementation of the government measure until the expiry of the deadline, legal entities submitted 1,615 applications to the regional offices of the Property and Legal Affairs Office, 1,266 applications alone out of which have been registered since the beginning of the year.
 
– If one takes into account that more than 100,000 applications were received since the beginning of the implementation of this measure, i.e. in one year, it can be concluded that “1m2 = EUR 1” initiative was successful. The project “1m2 = EUR 1” resolves a decade-long issue, providing the citizens with a historic opportunity to become owners of a land, which they have used for years and considered as their own, at a symbolic price. By taking this step they create capital for themselves and for the future generations, it was indicated in the press release of the Ministry of Finance.(MIA)