An additional short extension has been given for the completion of Farm Improvement Plans (FIPs) for the Knowledge Transfer (KT) Programme, according to the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine.

Farmers who have yet to submit their FIP have an extra two days to get their plans completed and sent in, with the new deadline closing on Wednesday night (August 23) at midnight.

“As of the morning of Monday, August 21, approximately 16,100 Farm Improvement Plans have been completed by the relevant KT Group Facilitators. Over 1,700 further Farm Improvement Plans are also in progress on the KT system,” a department spokesperson has said.

“Additionally, over 14,500 Animal Health Measures have been fully completed and submitted by KT-approved private veterinary practitioners to date with a further 110 in progress.

To facilitate the submission of outstanding data, the deadline for the submission of FIPs and Animal Health Measures has now been extended to midnight on Wednesday, August 23.

To address any queries, the department has announced the availability of out-of-hours support, which will remain open until 7:00pm this evening and tomorrow, and until the deadline of 12:00am on Wednesday (August 23).

This is the third extension given for the KT Programme. Originally, the deadline for the submission of FIPs was supposed to be May 31, but this was extended by two months to July 31 by the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Michael Creed.

However, this deadline was further extended in late July.