The Department of Agriculture is encouraging all farmers participating in the Agri-Climate Rural Environment Scheme (ACRES) Co-operation project to consider applying to complete non-productive investments (NPIs).

Up to €17,500 in funding can be drawn down above the core annual payment over the five-year period of the contract. The level of funding for NPIs and landscape actions can also be topped up with unused funding from the core budget where an applicant is not drawing down the maximum payment.

The Department explains that this ensures that farmers who do not receive a score of 8 (results-based payments) and who are restricted on payments they could receive from ACRES general actions (due to the ring-fencing rule) and organic farmers who receive reduced payments for scores 8/9/10, will have the ability to draw down the full funding of €52,500 over the five years.

Approval process

The approval process for NPIs has been delayed significantly with the Department targeting that applications submitted in 2023 will be approved before the end of 2024.

It intends to greatly reduce the time frame from applying to approval and has set an approval target date of spring 2025 for NPI applications submitted by the deadline of 4.30pm on Thursday 31 October.

The aim for landscape actions is to roll these out in quarter two to quarter three of 2025.

The Department recently stated that “In the meantime, work is also ongoing on the preparation of the Landscape (High Achievement) Bonus payment, which will enable farmers to be rewarded for high average scores across their private land within CP zones, or where they have a large area of land within the CP zone."

NPI actions

There are three categories of proposed NPIs to be made available to ACRES Co-operation participants.

  • Section 1 NPI Habitat and Wildlife Support
  • Section 2 NPI Infrastructure
  • Section 3 NPI Scrub / Track (Burren/Aran CP Zone only)

    • The table summarises the NPI listing, the payment rate and maximum payment per NPI.