Mr. Pat McCormack:

I thank the Chair and the committee for this opportunity. Our opening statement has been received. I will be brief. CAP has a huge part to play in farmers' income. Any discussion with farmers about CAP and single farm payments and the various different environmental schemes will regularly turn to the fact that payments are losing their value. Schemes are under-funded and are not index linked. We are lucky to receive the same amount of money as we did 15 or 20 years ago but which has far less purchasing power. The demands out there are far greater than they were 20 years ago, whether it is an environmental scheme or indeed the single farm payment as it was.

Conditionality is a huge issue. It replaces cost compliance. I want to acknowledge that the tagging issues were removed from conditionality and we welcome that. However, there needs to be flexibility in relation to monetary fines. Warning systems need to be applied to new conditionalities because these are family farms that depend on direct payments to keep them viable. The toughening of conditionality also leads to the reduction of possible options of different schemes into the future. An example would be the eco schemes. We need to be very careful about the level of conditionality in order to be in a position to have further practical greening and environmental schemes as we move forward.

One of the positives of the CAP in recent times is the easing of land eligibility. We are at a time when we are talking about huge environmental impact. There are various forums around the country that are talking about biodiversity etc. and eligibility was a huge issue. For example if a farmer hit two bad years and could not top his rushes he would nearly have to commit a track machine to take them out of it. So we welcome the easing there.

GAEC and in particular GAEC 2 is a huge issue with the re-wetting of peatlands. I know a farmer in north Kerry who has 70 acres, 70 cows and 30 acres of that is black land. That is a huge challenge. People need to be able to farm that land and make a commercial living from that land. Re-wetting really does undermine that viability. From an eco scheme perspective, this is a huge challenge. We as a lobby group lobbied for milk recording and solar panels and were unsuccessful. The menu that is available is very tight and rigid for a lot of dairy farmers. The 7% area can be a measure but to come up with the other measure is a huge challenge.

Convergence is an old flame of mine, shall we say. It is a huge issue because we are seeing convergence and a movement to payments. I have no issue with that if it is a fair system but it is on a per hectare basis. There are farmers with a very small envelope but a high payment per hectare who have been absolutely decimated in the last two rounds of CAP as regards convergence. Unfortunately, that trend is continuing and to protect the family farm structure and the smaller model that is out there we need to have that envelope taken into account. That is regrettable, it is a missed opportunity. The CRISS payment will be neutral for those farming at 30 ha and for those beyond the 30 ha it will be a penalty. In terms of capping, we have always been in favour of a €60,000 cap. We acknowledge that there is a cap of €60,000 on the BISS but how many farmers is that going to affect?

We welcome and acknowledge the need for young blood into the industry. A young farmers scheme is welcome but hugely challenging. I would question the off-farm income cap that was there in the past and its removal. Farmers with modest enough and very modest margins will find themselves cut by possibly 3% to 5%. That young farmer could be on €50,000, €100,000, €200,000, working 200 km away from the farm. If we are to be meaningful about keeping people on the land that is very necessary.

Pillar 2 is a scheme that can do a lot of good work but one would question the €90,000 ceiling and the relevance of that today given the way costings have gone up in recent times. It is critical that costings remain relevant. Unfortunately in 2022 that has been hugely challenging for farmers under the scheme. We need a meaningful commitment from the Department on a dairy equipment scheme as we go forward to reduce emissions and energy use. Energy providers are talking about having a levy during peak times and dairy farmers are part of that peak. We need to have more efficient ways of milking and cooling milk in the months and years ahead. We need a TAM scheme to have that as a viable option.

All forms of investment schemes are necessary. Dairy calf to beef scheme is critical. It is a disappointment that the ACRES scheme is confined to only 30,000 farmers while there are 50,000 farmers in GLAS. We need to see a scheme to bring people in up the equivalent of 65,000 if we are to be realistic about it. On the organic scheme, the viability of organic farming needs to be examined. That is a huge challenge. It is not just a challenge for the farm families but it is a challenge to rural viability, the viability of organics as we move forward.

In the dairy welfare scheme we would like to see the stock bull included as well as the DBI because that can be a huge issue in later calving cows. As we move forward we need to see an indexation because the value of money has been lost substantially over the plast five to ten years. It can happen. We saw it announced with forestry this week so I would urge that these schemes be relevant from a financial perspective as we move forward.