The Irish Farmers’ Association (IFA) has reiterated demands to include all applicants in the Agri Climate Rural Environment Scheme (ACRES) in a meeting with officials at the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM).
“We made it very clear that it is imperative all valid 46,600 applicants are accepted into ACRES and anybody waiting to get into Tranche 2 must also be accommodated,” the national chair of the IFA Rural Development Committee, Michael Biggins said.
ACRES and the Targeted Agricultural Modernisation Schemes (TAMS) have been the top priorities at the meeting.
The IFA delegation was led by Biggins, and the national chair of the IFA Hill Farming Committee, Caillin Conneely. Speaking afterwards, Biggins said:
“We can’t leave anyone behind. Too many low-income families, particularly in the vulnerable sectors, depend on agri-environment schemes to keep going.
“We’ve been pushing for this for some time now, and while we’ve been told solutions are being worked on, nothing has materialised.”
TAMS
The door is “not fully closed” to the reintroduction of dribble bars in subsequent tranches of TAMS, Biggins said, adding that positive data emerging from ongoing research could prove beneficial to this.
However, research results could also have positive implications for the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) inventories and how ammonia emissions from slurry are calculated, he said.
Commenting on TAMS 3 and the “obvious omissions” of dribble bars and rubber slat matts, Biggins said:
“We all know the emission reduction challenges we face as a sector, and the need for increased use of low emission slurry spreading (LESS), but dribble bars are an important part of that solution.
“They were [grant aided] for derogation farmers to meet their nitrates obligations, so now as the threshold [is] lower, and LESS becomes mandatory for more and more farmers, those operating lower intensity farms cannot be forced to use the more expensive options.
“Particularly when they have been shown to be less suitable on hilly or more marginal ground.”
Demand vs. funding
While the broader scope and increased list of eligible items, including solar, is “positive”, the IFA said it will undoubtedly be met with increased demand.
This demand must be matched with adequate funding to ensure farms across all sectors can make necessary on-farm investments, the IFA said.
The closing date for the first tranche of the new TAMS in June is of particular concern for the association, which claims that this will mean approvals are not likely to issue until August.
Raising concerns that it will be extremely difficult for any grant-aided construction work to take place this year, the IFA requested the DAFM to bring forward the deadline for the first tranche.