Minister briefs farmers on Single Payments
Farmers can declare lands which they acquire up to April 30.
There may be changes regarding ineligibility of lands used for production of potatoes and fruit and vegetables for claiming the Single Payment.
It will, however, be some weeks before discussions with the European Commission on this are concluded.
Online application: Agriculture and Food Minister Mary Coughlan has introduced, on a pilot basis, an online application facility. “The online application has several benefits, from the built-in validations, which will result in fewer errors in applications being lodged, to the acknowledgement of receipt of the application by my Department, via an immediate return message”, said the Minister. “I should point out that farmers are, of course, free to continue lodging applications in the normal way, by post, or hand delivered to any Department office”.
Unused Entitlements: Where Single Payment Scheme Entitlements have not been “used” in 2005 and 2006, and where the holder still does not “use” them in their entirety by the 2007 Scheme, they will be surrendered to the National Reserve.
A farmer “uses” entitlements by engaging in a farming activity and declaring for the purposes of the Single Payment Scheme one hectare of eligible land for each Single Payment entitlement held.
“In order to alert farmers to the fact that they could lose Entitlements in 2007, all farmers will be written to by my Department to ensure that everyone knows precisely the implications for their entitlements should they fail to lodge an application under the 2007 Single Payment Scheme or fail to declare sufficient eligible hectares”, said Minister Coughlan. She said potential to lose entitlements will arise only for a relatively small number of farmers who have not declared sufficient hectares to date under the Single Payment Scheme.
Farmers had to apply to activate Entitlements in 2005; by doing so, farmers then had the 2006 and 2007 Schemes in which to claim payment on their Entitlements, by declaring eligible hectares. Those who applied in 2005 to activate entitlements, but did not declare eligible lands in 2005 or 2006; and those who did not declare sufficient hectares to use all entitlements in 2005 and 2006, will lose un-used entitlements in 2007, if they do not claim them.
Farmers who do not declare sufficient hectares are deemed to have been paid on different entitlements each year, within the same category, as follows: a farmer with 100 entitlements, each of the same unit value, declaring 40 eligible hectares each year, including 2007, is deemed to have claimed entitlements 1 to 40 in 2005, 41 to 80 in 2006, and in 2007 will be deemed to have claimed 81 to 100, together with 1 to 20. Therefore, while this farmer did not fully use entitlements in any of the three years (2005 to 2007), none of his entitlements will be surrendered to the National Reserve in 2007.
Differing values: For the first time, provision is being made for farmers who hold entitlements of differing values to indicate the order in which they wish to have their entitlements paid. This will not be required by the vast majority of farmers, who hold only one set of entitlements, nor by farmers who declare a number of eligible hectares equal to or in excess of their number of entitlements.
In a small number of cases, farmers not in a position to declare an eligible hectare of land for each entitlement held in 2007, who hold entitlements of differing values, may choose a specific order of payment to suit their circumstances. They can apply to the Department on a “Payment Order of Entitlements” form.
The normal payment order for farmers who hold more than one set of entitlements and who do not declare sufficient hectares is as follows. Firstly, set-aside entitlements, where applicable, take priority. Secondly, entitlements that come in full from the National Reserve are paid, and thereafter, standard entitlements or topped-up National Reserve entitlements, commencing with the highest value entitlements.
