Additional funding has been secured for the Straw Incorporation Measure (SIM). The scheme was oversubscribed for 2023, with over 70,000ha down for chopping from a total of 3,440 applications.

A budget of €10m had been set a side for the measure, but a total of 56,700ha of cereal straw and 13,900ha of oilseed rape straw meant that an additional €6m was needed to pay all applicants.

The Department of Agriculture has told the Irish Farmers Journal that letters were issued to all eligible applicants last week.

Successful

“Additional funding has been secured and ranking and selection has not been applied,” the Department stated. This means that all applicants will be successful.

Farmers looking for the letters should go to their account on agfood.ie to find them.

Irish tillage farmers have exceeded the target set out for straw chopping under the climate action plan.

Under that plan, the target is to chop and incorporate 35,000ha of the cereal area by 2025 and 55,000ha of the cereal area by 2030.