Bid to aid cash flow as floods add to farm crisis

By Stephen Cadogan

Thursday, November 26, 2009

FARMERS are to get an an initial allocation of €2 million in emergency relief for flood victims, and the €45 second instalment of farm waste management scheme (FWMS) grants, and €39m of REPS payments, will be brought forward to December from early in 2010.

Announcing the bringing forward of payments, Agriculture Minister Brendan Smith said he was very conscious of farmers’ income difficulties, and wanted to improve their cash flow by bringing forward almost €85m of payments.

The decision goes some way to meeting IFA President Padraig Walshe’s request that outstanding Single Farm Payment, REPS and Disadvantaged Areas payments be brought forward to help the hard-pressed farming sector.

But he also demanded emergency aid for rural dwellers whose houses have been flooded and for farmers who lost winter feed in floods. He said effective waterways maintenance would spare communities from flooding devastation. "The general disruption that has occurred because of the heavy rainfall can be avoided if we get back to the practice of clearing rivers and streams on a regular basis. Spending millions of euro on flood defences will only protect the town where they are built, and will push the problem downstream to other towns and rural areas."

Mr Smith said a supplementary estimate for his Department will also provide €1.2m for the Food Institutional Research Measure, along with the extra 2009 FWMS and REPS funding.

This story appeared in the printed version of the Irish Examiner Thursday, November 26, 2009