Establishment of the single compendium

The commitment to establish the single compendium and to cultivate or conduct it as a direct farmer or professional agricultural entrepreneur for a period of at least ten years after the transfer must be evidenced by a special declaration made in the deed of purchase.
The law speaks verbatim of “transfer for any reason,” so both paid and unpaid transfers are to be considered included in the regulations.
Consequently, purchases by original title are excluded, not involving these, transfer.
It is questionable whether the purchase of bare ownership falls under the facilitative provision of the rule.
A crucial point in the legislation is whether the single compendium must be established by a single act or can also be established by several acts, chronologically successive.
There are interpretative doubts, as the legislature, after providing that “the establishment of single compendium is made by a declaration made by the purchasing or transferee party in the deed of purchase or transfer,” specifies that “in such a case, only the notary fees for the deed of purchase or transfer reduced to one-sixth are due.” The use of the latter aside has still led to the view that there may be different ways of constituting the unique compendium:
1) that of subsidized purchase with a commitment to establish the single compendium and to cultivate and conduct it for at least ten years after transfer;
2) that of the establishment of the single compendium, as a progressive-forming case, which would allow multiple purchases to be made at successive times until the area required for the establishment of the single compendium is reached.
For the former aspect, a deadline is expressly stipulated; for the latter, no deadline is stipulated. Proponents of this thesis note how it is often not easy to acquire in one context land belonging to different owners, and also point out the economic difficulties that may exist in having to purchase, with a single deed, it is also adduced the possibility, legislatively provided, to constitute the compendium with non-contiguous land.
However, it is precisely the lack of a deadline that leads one to believe that the penalty for failure to set up the compendium operates only for tax purposes and does not affect the validity of the deed of division or split. It was held that the lack of a time limit leaves the sanctionable case undetermined, just as it leaves it undetermined with regard to the compendium provided by Law 448/2001.” And again, adhering to this thesis, the solution in case of purchase of only rural buildings, in the absence of simultaneous purchase of land, is not peaceful.
Those who argue for the termination condition view that failure to establish the compendium operates as a termination condition. Consequently, there would be the immediate occurrence of all the
effects provided for in Leg. 99/04, but these would be resolutely conditional on failure to reach the minimum extension. This thesis finds its limitation in the failure to provide a time limit within which the compendium must be established.
Proponents of the single purchase argument, on the other hand, believe that there must be concurrentness between subsidized purchases and the establishment of the compendium.
With Legislative Decree 101/2005, it seems that the legislature wanted to fill the previous legislative gap, although from the explanatory report and the technical report attached to Legislative Decree. 101/05, an absolutely unexpected rationale emerges, as it is said that the “clarification to Article 7 of Legislative Decree No. 99/04 regarding single compendium,” was “necessary to avoid the unfortunate practice of subjecting those who want to establish a single compendium to double notary fees, both for the deed of purchase or transfer of properties and for the ‘establishment’ of the single compendium.”
In truth, relying on a literal interpretation of it and on the basis of copious tax practice, one comes to believe that there are two possible ways of constituting the unique compendium, namely:
– Contextuality between purchase and constitution of the compendium, in compliance with its objective and subjective limits, as highlighted above; in relation to this mode of constitution of the compendium;
– Possibility of constituting the compendium with temporally successive deeds, preordained to the constitution of the compendium itself, in each of which the acquiring or transferee party assumes the commitment to constitute the compendium, which may arise only upon reaching the necessary surface area through a special declaration of “constitution in compendium”, contained in the last deed of purchase (or even in separate deed, pursuant to art. 5 bis co. 11 quater introduced by d. lg. 101/2005)”.
This situation involving the purchase of the land and the establishment of the compendium makes it more possible to pursue the purposes of amalgamating land ownership in all those cases where the land belongs to different owners, without underestimating the resulting possibility of allowing investments to be diluted over time. Finally, it should be noted how this possibility especially favors young people who want to invest in agriculture, a need that was deemed preeminent by the legislature, as reflected in all the particularly favorable legislation dictated for young farmers.
It should be pointed out that in order to prevent the competent Offices from precluding any possible effective control, the commitment to establish the Compendium (which must be indicated in every land transfer deed) must be fulfilled within the period of 3 years from the date of the first deed (in the case of several deeds).
Said time limit, in the absence of any provision for time limits, is what Supreme Court jurisprudence has held to be applicable from a fiscal standpoint.
In the event of forfeiture in the three-year period, all benefits provided for the establishment of the compendium will be forfeited, except for the subsidized registration taxes, if in the deed, the granting of the benefits provided for in Paragraph 4^ of Art. 1 of Legislative Decree. 99/04.

Attorney Chiara Roncarolo

Attorney Maurizio Randazzo