Charlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I have been in regular contact with farming organisations and farm groups on issues relating to the tillage sector. Yesterday, I met with one of the stakeholders, namely, the Irish Grain Growers, and last week I met the IFA tillage committee to discuss the challenging situation in the sector at the moment in the light of the poor harvest.

Earlier this year, I specifically requested and secured support for the sector from the EU agriculture reserve in light of the significant challenges relating to the weather and harvest this year. A support package of €7.1 million has been allocated to the sector under this fund. A one-off flat-rate payment of €28 per hectare will be made on the area of oilseed rape, winter and spring barley, wheat and rye declared under the BISS this year. Payments will be made on a minimum area of 5 ha and capped at 100 ha per grower.

In the budget announced two weeks ago, I secured an additional €8 million in funding that will be specifically targeted at the sector. I am currently engaging with farming organisations on the best way to utilise this funding. Obviously, some farmers have not yet harvested their grain. The farming organisations have made that point to me. I am open to their suggestions and will work with them to see how we can best utilise and structure the funding I got in the budget announced two weeks ago.

Fertiliser is a major input cost on tillage farms. To support organic nutrient utilisation where it is needed, I will be engaging with the European Commission to allow the introduction of a 70% TAMS 3 support measure for manure storage facilities on farms importing livestock manure under a contract relationship. I am also seeking to secure a separate investment ceiling of €90,000 for slurry storage investments.

I strongly support the tillage sector and have done so in recent years. I doubled the annual budget for the protein aid scheme from €3 million to €7 million. The tillage incentive scheme resulted in payments of approximately €11 million to scheme applicants in the past two years. Importantly, the straw incorporation measure I introduced for the first time has paid €19.5 million so far and I have allocated an extra €7 million to it this year in recognition of the pressures on tillage farmers.

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