Calls have been made for the Department of Agriculture to allow for a higher GLAS payments to be made in the part payment to commonage farmers by IFA Rural Development Chairman, Flor McCarthy.

The Department is currently paying the full three-month payment to any commonage farmers on the first 17ha only.

As a result, he says that in some cases farmers are being left short and will have to wait until next May before they get the full €1,200 due.

“This is unfair and leaves these low-income farmers with a serious cash flow difficulty,” he said.

McCarthy also said that in relation to the payout to all first phase GLAS farmers, IFA has called for the full three-month payments of around €20m to be paid out immediately.

GLAS 2

With regard to the second phase of GLAS, Flor McCarthy has welcomed the application of 14,000 farmers into the scheme.

“It is now up to Minister Coveney to accept all of the applicants into the scheme and to inform them of their acceptance by the end of January.

On the third phase of the scheme, McCarthy said the Minister must now open up GLAS for up to 10,000 farmers.

“This is important to achieve the target of 50,000 farmers in scheme by 2016,” he said.