Macra president, Elaine Houlihan has called for the establishment of a “generational just transitioning fund for farming” to address the issue of generational renewal.
Houlihan said she has written to Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Charlie McConalogue, requesting a meeting to engage on the setting up of such a fund.
Engagement with government is needed to ensure future initiatives to address generational renewal have “considerably more take-up than the Succession Planning Advice Grant”, she said.
The Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM) recently confirmed that 71 applications have been received under the current tranche of the grant scheme.
The grant provides payments of up to €1,500 to help farmers aged 60 years and above to seek succession advice, covering up to 50% of vouched legal, accounting and advisory costs.
Houlihan said that the number of 71 applicants is “disappointing” but “not surprising”. “Farmers do not know what way to turn when it comes to generational land transfer,” she added.
Generational renewal
She said that while the organisation has been concerned with the transitioning of land from one generation to the next for the past 80 years, a “crisis point” has now been reached.
“One third of farmers want a succession scheme today, that equates to 44,500 farmers, another 44,500 would consider it, creating a cohort of 89,000 farmers.
“What is needed is a generational just transitioning fund for farming,” she said calling on Minister McConalogue to work with the organisation to address the issue the “soonest possible”.
The Macra president added that it is the organisation’s “intention” to work with the DAFM towards creating the “right” pre-conditions for generational renewal to occur.