European Commission backs drought-affected farmers

By Joe Leogue

The European Commission is to bring forward grant payments to farmers and will relax ‘greening’ rules on land, in a bid to help the agriculture industry through the current extreme droughts.

The announcement comes as the Irish Farmers Association has called on retailers to “cease playing with fresh food pricing” and assist producers during this difficult period.

The EC said farmers will be able to receive their direct and rural development payments in advance and will be granted more flexibility to use land that would normally not be used for production, in order to feed their animals.

“I am very concerned about these prolonged climatic developments,” commissioner Phil Hogan said.

“I have been in contact with a number of ministers from affected countries to discuss the situation and get up-to-date assessments of its impact.

“The Commission, as always, is ready to support farmers affected by drought using a number of instruments, including higher advance payments, derogations from greening requirements and state aid.

The Common Agricultural Policy already provides a safety net for farmers who have to deal with unpredictable events. I am encouraging all Member States to look into all possible actions and measures provided for in our legislation.[/qoute]

Payments of up to 70% of the direct payment and 85% of payments under rural development to farmers will be brought forward from December to mid-October.

Meanwhile, IFA president Joe Healy has said the minimal rainfall in recent days “had done little to alleviate the stresses on farmers”.

He called on retailers to follow Musgraves’ lead after the retailer introduced supports that see its producers receive a price top-up per unit or per kg of vegetables sold to the company.

“We now urge all other retailers to extend the approach taken by Musgraves on field vegetables, to extend it to include other producers as such farmers producing fresh milk,” Mr Healy said.

“Most retailers sell some fresh milk at prices as low as 65-67c/l, which is insufficient to cover the true cost of putting fresh milk on the supermarket shelf.

“Unsustainable discounting of fresh food is wrong at any time, but it is particularly damaging when farmers are facing weather-related massively increased feed expenditure.

“Teagasc has predicted that the feed requirement of dairy cows could this year cost 75% more than a normal year because of fodder shortages and the need to purchase additional fodder and feed.

“If retailers are serious about securing supplies of fresh food, especially vegetables and fresh milk, they need to shoulder their part of the responsibility for supporting producers in this exceptionally difficult year, and cease playing with fresh food pricing to gain short-term market share at farmers’ expense.”