€12m REAP payments to issue to over 3,000 farmers

Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Charlie McConalogue has announced the commencement of the 2022 payments under the Results Based Environment Agri Pilot Project (REAP) scheme today (Tuesday, December 20).

Almost €12 million will be paid to over 3,300 farmers under the REAP scheme, which represents 90% of all participants, the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM) said.

The current round of REAP payments includes the participation and environmental payments (calculated from field scoring and assessment) and late meadow bonus.

The two-year scheme was launched early last year to trial an agri-environment results-based scoring and payment system on farms across the country, the DAFM said.

Announcing the issuing of REAP payments today, Minister McConalogue said:

“REAP is a farmer-friendly pilot scheme and we explored how we can bring greater environmental and biodiversity value to how we farm.

“Using this new approach, the project has been a great success and has paved the way for the broadening of the results-based approach through the Agri-Climate Rural Environment Scheme (ACRES).”

The commencement of the 2022 REAP payments will support farmers in their efforts to continue Irish agriculture’s journey to become more sustainable and meet the ambitious climate objectives, he said.

REAP

Under the scheme Irish farmers have been enabled to modify their farming practices and for their advisors to become more knowledgeable on results-based assessments, Minister McConalogue added.

Achievements under the project, which currently comprises 3,650 participants, includes:

• the environmental assessment and scoring of almost 32,000ha using a combination of the low-input grassland and multi-species ley scorecards;
• the training of over 400 farm advisors and the training of REAP farmers in the results-based approach;
• In conjunction with their advisor, REAP participants undertook environmental improvement works to increase the environmental value of their land with the aim of improving their score in year two. 

Payments for complementary actions (tree and hedge planting and hedge gapping) totaling €400,000 issued earlier in the year to 400 REAP farmers.  

The county breakdown of payments announced today is as follows:

The roll-out of REAP fulfilled the government’s commitment to pilot an agri-environment project during the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) transition period, supported by additional exchequer funding.

Minister McConalogue said he looks forward to seeing the benefits of the trial scheme continued through the upscaling of the model through the €1.5 billion ACRES scheme.