Pig farm grants to increase

A new financial stimulus to ensure pig farmers can meet new EU sow welfare requirements by the end of the year has been announced by Agriculture Minister Simon Coveney.

The Sow Welfare TAMS investment ceiling is being increased from €300,000 per holding to €500,000 per applicant for the first sow house, with further amounts of €300,000 for each of the next three houses.

The grant rate remains unchanged at 40%, but previous sow house grant-aid under the 2007 Sow Welfare Scheme and the original TAMS Scheme will be taken into account for the purposes of grant rate.