Search for the right results in agri-environment schemes

Ireland’s 15,000 farmers in hill areas have been “framed”, destocked, inspected, designated, and will be “converged” between now and 2019.

Scheme after scheme was designed to support them, while protecting nature on the hills. And they are still failing, according to the latest assessment.

The millennium year of 2000 proved fateful for hill farmers in Donegal, Leitrim, Sligo, Mayo, Galway, and Kerry who use commonage. They were required to destock by 30%, in a framework plan designed to protect uplands.