Farmers start receiving single farm and disadvantaged area payments

A STEADILY increasing number of farmers report they have been receiving their disadvantaged area and single farm payments this week.

Among them was Pat Enright, a dairy farmer from Castleisland in Kerry, who appeared in Monday’s Irish Examiner while still awaiting an €8,900 payment. When Pat went to view his bank account on Tuesday morning the cheque had arrived.

Mr Enright said yesterday: “After the article appeared, I got a phone call from our IFA county chairman, James McCarthy, on Monday to tell me that the money was in the bank. It wasn’t there when I went to look on Monday, but I suppose it must have made it into the account after midnight.

“I have heard of others who have also been paid, so the department has obviously upped the ante on it. There has been a lot of pressure on them from the IFA.”

While the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food has come under fierce pressure from the IFA, the ICMSA, Macra na Feirme and other farming groups over what they perceive as delays, department officials have repeatedly insisted that the payments are effectively ahead of schedule, even relative to last year.

Agriculture Minister Brendan Smith has also reminded applicants that Ireland is the first EU jurisdiction to have delivered payments, thanks to an unique deal he brokered with Brussels. Even farmers in the North have yet to receive any payment.

Mr Smith said: “The department is continuing to process single farm and disadvantaged area payment applications” and said “significant progress had been made in recent days, with an additional 9,610 disadvantaged area payments made since last Friday, worth €6.8 million. A total of 89,096 farmers have now been paid.”

Mr Smith also confirmed that his department had now processed 111,500 SPS applications, with payments worth €517m issued in just two weeks.

He said: “I want to reassure farmers that the department is committed to allocating such resources as are necessary to ensure that the essential digitisation of applicants’ maps onto the Department’s Land Parcel Identification System (LPIS) and the processing of payments are proceeding as quickly as possible.”

He also reiterated his previous warning that “any failings or shortcomings in LPIS would leave the department open to the very real risk of significant fines. I am not prepared to take such a risk and will not compromise the value of direct payments to Irish farmers.”

The minister said he has set a very demanding schedule of payments for the disadvantaged area scheme, single payment scheme and the new grassland sheep scheme from September to December 2010.

“I want to reiterate my intention to adhere to this schedule,” he said. “My department will continue to make multiple payment runs on a weekly basis to pay those farmers whose applications are fully processed and cleared.”

Mr Smith also said he had put in place an arrangement whereby farmers not in receipt of their full 50% SPS advance payment can receive a supplementary advance payment.