The Department of Agriculture is poised to launch a new peatland rewetting scheme in the coming months, the Irish Farmers Journal can reveal.

The scheme is to be funded under the Rural Development Programme.

The Department has estimated that there are approximately 300,000ha of drained carbon rich soils used for agriculture in Ireland, the majority of which are used for grazing cattle.

It suggests that payments for such a rewetting measure could be similar to those received by farmers in GLAS who take part in the low-input permanent pasture and traditional hay meadow actions.

In GLAS 1, farmers were paid up to €315/ha for up to 10ha in the traditional hay meadow action.

“Payments may need to be very long-term or indefinite, as it is unlikely that a farmer would keep potentially more productive land wet if not compensated to do so.

“There would also be an additional monitoring, reporting and verification cost annually to monitor and verify the land use changes and further improve the reliability of figures,” the Department said.

Payments

The costs of such rewetting measures are difficult to calculate, according to the Department. It is understood a call for proposals as to how the new rewetting scheme will operate is to be issued in the coming weeks.

The Department has said that no detailed costings on land rewetting have been undertaken.

Reaction

The INHFA is advising any farmers looking at this option to be “very wary” of such a scheme.

It said that it expects the scheme to have a rule similar to the forestry replanting rule, where once rewetted it will no longer be available for agricultural use.

The hill farmer group has also queried the length of time payment from the scheme will be available for and said that farmers would be advised to get legal clarity on the impact of deliberately blocking up drains.