Minister for Agriculture Charlie McConalogue has made promises but is not delivering on them when it comes to so-called forgotten farmers, says dairy farmer Niall Ryan.

The forgotten farmer group represents those who missed out on installation grants, young farmer top-ups and other schemes in the last CAP.

Speaking to the Irish Farmers Journal, the Limerick farmer said he has been contacting the Department of Agriculture, successive ministers and the European Commission for the last 20 years, first starting in 2002, and that overall, the response has been “non-existent”.

The farmer said he has “no single farm payment” and is “operating on nothing”.

Ryan contended that the plight of the forgotten farmers was continually being overshadowed by some issue or other every year, but that the unfairness of their situation would have to be addressed at some stage.

Ryan said forgotten farmers are “not asking for the sun, moon and stars”, a “large parcel of money” or “anything for free”. He said farmers just wanted “what we should be entitled to”.

“If the minister is going to do something, get it done. If not, let us know and we can try and move on with our lives,” he said.

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