The Irish Natura and Hill Farmers Association (INHFA) claims that during a recent meeting with the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM), officials disclosed to the INHFA that 389 commonages have still not been assigned a planner or adviser in order to complete their commonage management plan (CMP). INHFA CAP chair Colm O’Donnell said these plans were mostly for CMPs under GLAS II.

The INHFA also alleges that planners received training and all the necessary documentation in August 2015, but, to date, there has still been no CMPs lodged to the Government. These CMPs, they say, must be lodged with DAFM and approved by October before the EU commission will clear payment for the full year for both GLAS I and II payments.

Furthermore, the organisation claims that the software to complete the plans is still under development and no date has been announced as to when it will be ready for use.

Department response

Responding to the allegations, a DAFM official told the Irish Farmers Journal: “Under GLAS, commonage management plans must be prepared for all commonages included in GLAS applications. Approved advisers were appointed in 2015 to the 2,500 commonages included in tranche one applications.

“An analysis of tranche two applications showed that the majority of GLAS II applicants’ farm commonages for which an adviser had already been assigned. With a further 389 additional commonages identified to which advisers must be assigned, approximately 60% of which are under 50ha in size, the Department has, this week, invited applications from approved GLAS commonage advisers for the remaining GLAS II commonages to allow work to commence on these.

“The preparation of CMPs requires detailed on-the-ground assessments and the advisers assigned to GLAS applications confirmed at the end of 2015 that work had already commenced on all of the CMPs for which they are responsible.

“The online CMP system is currently in the final stages of development and will be released to advisers shortly. This system provides advisers with a facility to submit the details of the plans they have been working on with GLAS participants, including information on stocking rates, to the Department.

“The online CMP facility is designed to facilitate the submission of the results of the assessment work carried out by advisers in electronic rather than hard copy format.

“The closing date for submission of CMPs is 1 December 2016 and the Department is currently satisfied that all plans can be submitted within this time frame.

“The Department will, of course, continue to monitor the position with the objective of having the work completed to facilitate payments to all commonage farmers under the scheme.”

Request for leniency

O’Donnell says the time frame is too tight and is calling on DAFM to provide some leniency to farmers who still do not have a planner assigned.

“At this stage, most, if not all, field work should be completed by advisers and farmers who have applied for GLAS I. Applicants need to know their allocated individual minimum stocking rates as this action was to be achieved by the end of 2016. Flexibility on stocking targets must now be afforded to those farmers who have applied for GLAS II under the CMP action where an approved adviser has not yet been appointed.

“It is virtually impossible to expect these cases to catch up by the end of 2016 and INHFA has suggested that these affected farmers are given until the end of 2017 to meet their individual minimum and the commonage minimum extended to the end of 2019.”

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