The Irish Farmers’ Association (IFA) is the latest farm organisation to call for immediate payouts under the €50 million Beef Finisher Payment (BFP) scheme.
IFA National Livestock Committee chairman Brendan Golden said the payment should be made by the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine Charlie McConalogue “without delay”.
“At our meeting of the Livestock Committee this week, we heard numerous calls for the immediate payout under the scheme. The closing date was in September and farmers who incurred losses earlier this year have cashflow pressures,” he said.
Applications to the scheme
“Over 28,000 valid applications have been made under the scheme for almost 466,000 animals, which is based on the number of cattle sent for slaughter in the period from February 1 to June 12,” Golden added.
“This is subject to a limit of 100 animals per herd at a payment rate of €100 per animal,” he said.
Brendan Golden said any surplus monies in the scheme, when outstanding appeal cases are dealt with, must be directed towards cattle that were exported for direct slaughter.
He said these animals can be easily identified from their export certs. They incurred the same losses as those processed in this country.
Other farm organisations
This latest call by the IFA echoes a similar call by the Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers’ Association (ICMSA) earlier in the week (November 11).
That association said that given that the closing date for applications was early September, it is to be expected that farmers should be receiving this payment without any further delay.
The department had given a commitment to make the payment in November.