Satellites pinpoint rushes to ensure land is farmed
If there is rush cover, the farmer is not eligible for a single farm payment for the land. Farm payments are based more and more on strictly “working” farmland — lands completely covered with rock and furze and rushes are not eligible unless they are cleared.
A senior official said land was not being deducted for rushes where cows were grazing grass, but only where the land was obviously not being farmed and rushes had completely taken over.
Kerry county councillor Danny Healy-Rae said there was intense focus on farmers in Kerry and West Cork.
“Farmers around here are actually terrified,” he said, adding that the threat to farm incomes due to bad weather and farm inspections was leading to depression. In some cases, he said, the pressure was being identified as a factor in suicides.
“Rushes are being pinpointed by satellite, but it has been too wet down here to go out and cut the rushes,” he said.
The Department of Agriculture said it was dealing sensitively with farmers and that there was an appeals system against the most extreme penalties for ineligible land.
Where, for instance, it was found that over 20% of the land was not being farmed or “ineligible”, the farmer would lose all the single farm payment for a year, a department source said.
In extreme cases, of half the farm being found to be rock and furze and so on, the farmer would be penalised for three years, as well as not receiving the single farm payment. All of this could be appealed.
However, the majority of infringements were between 3% and 20%. Inspectors and officials were very mindful of the pressures farmers were under, the department insisted. “The EU expect people to farm the land,” said a spokesperson.
Previously, all land would have been included in grant applications, but the EU is now demanding increased scrutiny.
