Farmers are being asked to “do more for the same payment” when it comes to the Knowledge Transfer (KT) Programme and are growing increasing frustrated about this, according to one farm organisation.
The Irish Natura and Hill Farmers’ Association (INHFA) said farmers are also exasperated with issues around “access and conditionality” in relation to the three-year programme.
The organisation is now calling on the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Charlie McConalogue and the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM) to urgently review the KT Programme.
According to DAFM, the programme aims to “foster knowledge exchange and innovation between advisors, farmers and other stakeholders”.
But INHFA national chair, Pheilim Molloy, said access to the scheme is “dependent on your farm advisor applying and being accepted as a facilitator by the Department of Agriculture”.
Molloy added: “If your farm advisor hasn’t applied or been accepted, then you won’t be able to join the scheme. This is blatantly unfair and must be changed.”
He said farmers are becoming increasingly vocal about their frustrations over the programme and in the last number of weeks, INHFA has identified KT as a key issue at meetings and it is also “seeing an increasing number of calls to our office relating to this”.
Meetings
The INHFA has highlighted that previously farmers had to attend five meetings or events to qualify for the payment for participating in the KT Programme, but in the current programme, this requirement has been increased to eight.
Molloy added: “Farmers are now expected to do more for the same payment which is effectively reduction in pay.
“This wouldn’t be tolerated in any other sector so we have to ask the question as to why is this okay for farmers to take such a cut?
“There continues to be mixed views around the KT Programme. There is a high level of resentment with some farmers around the payment rates which hasn’t been helped by increasing the attendance requirements.”
He said that some farmers also feel that they have been “shut out” of the programme, and “are rightfully annoyed and demanding action” from the minister over this.
The INHFA believes that Minister McConalogue should “consider at a minimum a pro-rata increase to the payment rates to acknowledge the increased attendance requirement”.
Knowledge transfer
Previously the minister told the Dáil that the new Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) has brought “a new approach to knowledge transfer (KT) – the new system is more targeted, with equal emphasis on CAP objectives and local needs”.
Minister McConalogue said: “An example of this, is that each participant will have an annual one-to-one planning meeting with the KT facilitator, using the farmer’s Basic Income Support for Sustainability Scheme (BISS) application so that the knowledge transfer can be applied to the goals of that farm and crucially can be evaluated in future years.
“This new KT Programme is far more tailored to the individual farm and targeted to local needs in accordance with the regulations.”