5 days ago
235 Farmers Yet to Receive Final Acres Payments for 2023 Dafm
A total of almost €515 million has now been paid to farmers in the Agri-Climate Rural Environment Scheme (ACRES), the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM) confirmed.
Balancing payments amounting to €11,342 were made on August 1 to 11 farmers for participation in the agri-environmental scheme in 2023.
This means the total paid in respect of participation in ACRES in 2023 is €248.8 million to 44,405 farmers, or over 99% of all ACRES tranche 1 participants.
DAFM said that 235 farmers have yet to receive their final payments for 2023. Of these participants, 38 have already received an interim payment of either €4,000 or €5,000, respectively.
The department added that in many instances, this will cover the entire amount of the payment due.
Advance payments, in respect of ACRES participation in 2024, were made on August 1 to 118 participants, with those payments amounting to €504,572.
This payment run brought total 2024 advance payments to almost €227 million, paid to 52,810 farmers, or almost 98% of all ACRES participants.
Advance payments for 2024 have still to be made to 1,104 ACRES participants across tranches 1 and 2.
Of these 1,104 farmers, 235 are also awaiting their balancing payment in respect of 2023, as that must be paid before the 2024 advance payment may be made to them.
Balancing payments for participation in the scheme in 2024 commenced on May 15.
The most recent payment run of August 1 paid €178,195 to a further 317 farmers.
This brought the total paid in balancing payments in respect of 2024 to approximately €39 million, to 51,702 participants.
DAFM said that this means that almost 96% of all participants are up to date with payments.
ACRES payments will continue to be made weekly to the remaining participants once their contracts are cleared for payment.
Meanwhile, DAFM said that 125,000 scorecards were issued at the beginning of June of which 65,546 have been submitted to date.
ACRES scorecards must be submitted by August 31 to allow advance payments to be made in November.
The claims system for Non-Productive Investments (NPIs) is also now open for applications.
To date, 57 claims have been submitted for 2023 while 12 have been submitted for 2024.
The department added that the application window for Landscape Actions remains open.
