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Payments totalling €365,000 have now been issued to 5,300 sheep keepers, under the EID tag subsidy scheme for sheep.
Further payments will issue as more farmers make their first purchase of tags during the year, the Department said in a statement.
These payments are on a once-off basis.
Maximum amount
A maximum amount of up to €100 is payable for the first order for EID tags purchased by farmers after 1 October 2018 under the scheme.
Sheep farmers do not need to make an application for this payment.
The Department will calculate the amount due to each farmer under the scheme and will issue payments on a quarterly basis as farmers make qualifying purchases of tags.
Mandatory EID
The subsidy aims to assist transition to the controversial mandatory EID tagging of sheep, which comes into effect from June this year.
Minister for Agriculture Michael Creed said the current national sheep identification system is widely acknowledged to be very complex, with an over-reliance on the manual transcription of individual sheep identification numbers.
He added that it put Ireland’s sheep traceability system on a par with other major competitor exporting countries in maintaining and securing new international markets for Irish sheepmeat.
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