Farm inspections: more than 2,500 farmers fined under cross-compliance last year

More than 2,500 farmers were fined some or all of their Basic Payment Scheme (BPS) money last year for breaching the rules on cross-compliance.

Figures from the Department of Agriculture show that it carried out 7,645 cross-compliance inspections on farms in 2016.

Inspectors found that 2,986 farmers, almost 40% of the total, were farming within all the cross-compliance rules that must be obeyed in order to receive their BPS.

However, Department inspectors found problems with the remaining 4,659 farms.

In almost half of those farms (46%), the cross-compliance breach was not significant enough to warrant any monetary penalty.

Penalties imposed

Inspectors imposed a BPS penalty on 2,533 farmers but the majority (81%) of those were given the lowest category penalty of between 1% and 5% of their annual BPS money.

Some 325 farmers were fined between 5% and 20% of their BPS, while 90 farmers were fined from 20 % to 99% of their total BPS.

Sixty-two farmers lost 100% of their BPS because of blatant breaches of the cross-compliance last year.

Best and worst counties

On a county basis, farmers in Dublin, Clare, Kildare, Kerry and Galway performed best in the cross-compliance inspections.

Some 64% of 39 farm inspections in Co Dublin were found to be free from any cross-compliance issues. This was followed closely by Clare (59.1%), Kildare (58.2%), Kerry (54%) and Galway (50.6%).

The worst-performing county was Monaghan, where only 22.5% of all farms inspected were clear of any cross-compliance issue.

It was followed by Waterford (22.9%), Wexford (24.8%), Cavan (26.2%) and Louth (28.2%).

Inspections completed

The county with the most cross-compliance inspections last year was Cork, with 739 inspections, followed by Tipperary (643), Galway (614) and Mayo (602). Cork had the highest number of BPS fines imposed on farmers at 264, while Tipperary had the second highest at 213.

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