The government is being called on to provide “full tax exemptions” in Budget 2025 for all payments farmers receive under various environmental schemes.
The Irish Natura and Hill Farmers’ Association (INHFA) has called for all payments made to farmers under schemes such as the Agri Climate Rural Environmental Schemes (ACRES) and the eco-scheme to be disregarded for tax purposes.
INHFA president Vincent Roddy said: “Over the last number of months we have seen significant problems around the ACRES programme that has angered and frustrated farmers in equal measure.
“With confidence in the scheme at an all-time low, the government has an ideal opportunity in this budget to reinstate a level of confidence and positivity around the ACRES programme by providing a tax exemption for all ACRES payments.
“The basis for such an exemption is in recognition of the climate and biodiversity emergency declared by Dáil Éireann in May 2019,” Roddy added.
He claimed that, in declaring that emergency, it has given the government additional powers to address this emergency in a similar manner to the housing crisis where a tax free allowance on rental income if currently available.
“Beyond emergency measures, an exemption on ACRES and eco-scheme payments would also mirror the tax-free exemptions that are available for forestry premiums while also recognising the additional costs incurred by farmers through the ACRES programme that also includes reduced output and income,” the INHFA president added.
Roddy said that an exemption of this nature for environmental scheme payments would be “an enormous benefit…in improving farmer goodwill around ACRES and wider environmental ambition”.
Budget 2025
Budget 2025 will be announced later today (Tuesday, October 1).
High farm input costs, poor weather conditions and in some cases disappointing prices on returns means that Budget 2025 is especially important for farm families.
But what are farmers hoping that Budget 2025 will deliver for them? Agriland was out and about at a cattle sale at Tullow Mart to hear what’s on their minds, and you can see that video here.
Farmers told Agriland that it has been a difficult couple of years, particularly in relation to raising sucklers.
But costs are an underlying factor for all systems and many farmers said they do not feel that the government is putting the right financial supports in place.
Whether it is improved payments for the suckler sector or incentivising tillage farmers to help them get a “decent return from the tillage crop” there is a demand for government to do more.