More than 34,000 environmental actions have been approved under the Agri-Climate Rural Environment Scheme (ACRES), Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Charlie McConalogue has announced.
A total of 4,148 farmers, or 96.7% of total applicants, will begin receiving confirmation today (Thursday, December 12), that their applications for Non-Productive Investments (NPIs) under the ACRES Co-Operation Scheme in 2023 were successful or partially successful.
Examples of NPIs include the installation of bat boxes and nest boxes for barn owls and kestrels, the erection of gates and electric fencing to prevent over and under grazing, and the movement of water troughs to optimum locations.
Decision letters will be available on agfood.ie from today. Hard copies will issue by post in the coming days. A summary of approvals will be uploaded on agfood.ie over the coming days, with hard copies to issue by post in January 2025.
The ‘ACRES CP NPI-Annual Works Plan 2023 Approval Summary’ will give details of the approved NPIs, and will include maps, by parcel, showing the location of approved NPIs on the holding.
The system to support the submission of claims and the processing of payments in respect of these approved investments will follow as early as possible in 2025.
ACRES NPIs
Making the announcement, the minister said: “These investments are an integral element of ACRES that support farmers to take specific measures to enhance environmental outcomes on their holdings, and thereby increase their payments under the scheme.
“The 34,085 actions being undertaken by farmers all around Ireland are vital to maintaining environmental integrity and increasing biodiversity.”
Applications, in the form of NPI annual work plans, are prepared and submitted by ACRES advisors on behalf of their clients, who are ACRES Co-operation participants.
Applications were submitted on behalf of 4,288 ACRES participants, with 43,896 individual NPIs included in the annual NPI work plans, Minister McConalogue added.
These applications were then screened by the Co-operation Project teams, and their screening decisions have been submitted to the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM).