ACRES payments ‘could be too little, too late' for future schemes
The issuing of delayed balancing payments for 2023 and 2024 under the Agri Climate Rural Environment Scheme (ACRES) 'could be too little, too late' for future agri-environment schemes, one farm organisation has warned.
As the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine works towards getting ACRES payments out to farmers, the Irish Natura and Hill Farmers' Association (INHFA) has said that the hold-up to these payments has caused 'irreparable damage' to both ACRES and similar schemes that might exist in future.
Pheilim Molloy, the national chairperson of the INHFA, said that while recent progress made in getting balancing payment out is positive, it has nonetheless left many farmers in an 'unacceptable' position.
He said: 'As we move into June and past the half point of ACRES programme we need to recognise that there are over 1,000 farmers that applied to join ACRES in November 2022 still awaiting their balancing payments.
'For these farmers and many more that have only been paid in recent weeks, the wait for their payment in addition to clarity on their overall payment is unacceptable.'
'Beyond these 1,000 farmers there are over 5,400 farmers still awaiting their first payment for 2024 which [amounts] to 10% of the 54,082 participants in the ACRES programme,' he added.
According to Molloy, this has left these farmers 'in a vulnerable financial position, due to uncertainty around payment dates and the balance of their overall payment'.
'This will leave farmers reluctant to join future schemes, especially where there isn't a clear indication of what payment farmers can expect to get, as well as definite timelines around these payment dates,' the INHFA national chair added.
The INHFA representative also cited concerns around habitat scoring for commonage farmers in the Co-operation Project (CP) areas.
For these farmers, landscape actions (LAs) were included to assist farmers on improving their habitat score, but as of yet none of these actions have been made available.
'This is another example of farmers losing out due to the failures of the department, which has indicated that these actions will not be available until the second or third quarter of this year,' Molloy said.
'Based on ACRES deadlines it is reasonable to now assume that these LAs won't be available until at least September which will be too late to positively influence the habitat scoring that has already started on these commonages,' he added.
'For these farmers and indeed all other farmers in ACRES, the inability by the department to deliver on payment dates and the actions to support farmers will be the defining element of the scheme, as well as being a major factor in their decision to partake…in any future agri-environment scheme,' Molloy said.
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