Agriculture:Government investment in agriculture and food development programmes is to reach €8.02 billion in the course of the National Development Plan.
While almost €7 billion of this had been identified in the negotiations which brought the Irish Farmers Association back into the national partnership process, some additional elements emerged yesterday.
The main bulk of the spend, €6.028 billion, will go towards enhancement of the environment and the countryside in a plethora of agri-environmental schemes, some of which are part-funded by the EU. The schemes involved include the Rural Environment Protection scheme which 60,000 farmers have now joined and the Farm Waste Management scheme.
This was brought in as part of the solution to the Nitrates Directive, which limits the amount of organic fertiliser which farmers may spread, and the times they may do so.
Over 30,000 farmers have joined the scheme to build facilities to store slurry or to make them compliant with new strict regulations which protect ground water quality.
The plan envisages spending €1.711 million on agriculture and forestry competitiveness and the remaining €289 million will go on the capital infrastructure and marketing of the food industry and its products.
It says the agri-food industry has been transformed in recent years by changes in EU policy, consumer demands and the structural changes in agriculture. Ireland has to invest in innovation and competitiveness at farm and processor level and place the emphasis on the consumer, focusing on high value markets in terms of food safety and quality, animal welfare and environmental responsibility, the plan emphasises.
It also points out that as only 10 per cent of Irish land is under forestry, Ireland remains one of the least-afforested countries in Europe and support is to be provided for continuing afforestation and the integration of forestry with agriculture, adopting a whole-farm approach and encouraging the establishment of agri-forestry systems.
IFA president Pádraig Walshe welcomed the plan adding that it was crucially important that balanced regional development was made a real priority in it.