The latest Schemes Payments update published by the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine shows €1.3m paid under the Basic Income Support for Sustainability (BISS) and the Complementary Redistributive Income Support for Sustainability (CRISS) in the week ending 31 January 2025. This brings the level of payment under these schemes to €833.29m, paid to 118,461 applicants.

The payments update explains that the BISS/CRISS payment figure also includes €34.1m paid under the Complementary Income Support for Young Farmers and €2.8m paid under the 2024 National Reserve. Regular payment runs continue under both schemes, as applications are cleared for payment.

Payments will possibly take place to another 2,000 applications based on the 2023 scheme year. Payments under the 2023 BISS and CRISS up to July 2024 showed 120,434 farmers were paid €844.5m.

ANCs

Regular payment runs also continue under the Areas of Natural Constraint (ANC) with sums paid out in the region of €200,000 to €300,000. The latest payment run saw €290,872 paid, bringing total payments to €246.04m paid to 98,124 applicants.

Comparing this to 2023 payment levels shows €249.7m paid to 99,670 applicants by July 2024. This means there is potentially in the region of 1,500 applicants who will receive a payment in the coming months as applications are cleared for payment.

Other schemes

Funds of €115,196 were paid under the 2024 Organic Farming Scheme (OFS). This brings payments for 2024 to €47.1m paid to 4,557 participants. This leaves in the region of 300 to 400 participants yet to receive a payment.

There was €67,757 paid under the 2024 Protein Aid Scheme. Total payments under the scheme now stand at €9.66m paid to 1,611 participants. It is unclear how many farmers are still to receive payment.

There was also €155,432 paid under the 2024 Straw Incorporation Measure (SIM), with €5.36m paid to 1,279 participants. The level of payment under SIM is well below recent years, due to farmers being given the option to bale straw under the Baling Assistance Payment.

There was approximately €100,000 paid under the Multi Species Sward Scheme 2024, bringing payments to €980,000 paid to 747 participants. The Red Clover Scheme proved more popular, with €2.06m paid to date to 1,073 participants, following €20,000 funding paid in the latest payment run.

The other scheme recording payments was the Targeted Agricultural Modernisation Scheme (TAMS), with €635,487 paid under TAMS III and €43,875 paid under TAMS II.

There have been 37,807 payment applications submitted under TAMS II, of which 37,545 have been paid, while there were 6,306 payment applications under TAMS III and 4,588 have been paid.

No update on ACRES

The Department of Agriculture’s Schemes Payment update published on a weekly basis unfortunately does not include updates on the Agri-Climate Rural Environment Scheme. There have been no recent updates released on the number of farmers paid in 2023 and 2024, and plans for remaining payments.