Only two marts have availed of the Mart ICT Infrastructure Scheme so far this year.
The scheme, which was officially announced in March, allowed livestock marts to apply to the department for a grant of a maximum of €5,000 to cover 50% of expenditure by a mart on ICT infrastructure.
However, take-up has been extremely low to date.
Commenting on this, Donegal mart manager and chairperson of Mart Managers of Ireland, Eimear McGuinness, said:
“The grant was there – but it had to be drawn down before the marts installed the equipment [which marts already did last year] and there’s no way around that.
“We did have a meeting with the department last week and we did discuss it. They did state that if there were software updates or such like to be done, marts have until November to apply for this funding.
“It was a PR stunt on behalf of the department and minister announcing this,” McGuinness said.
First mooted last November, the scheme was announced following a tough year for marts amid Covid-19 lockdowns and a rapid change to online trading.
Announcing the scheme at the time, the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine said that marts must ensure that they have high quality ICT infrastructure in place to facilitate online sales in their operations.
The closing date for receipt of applications is November 15, 2021, the department says.