French show way to support farms in Northern Ireland
French show way to support farms in Northern Ireland
By Philip Clarke
FRENCH-style land management contracts could be the way to redirect farm support in Northern Ireland, ensuring farmers are rewarded properly for all the services they provide, according to the Ulster Farmers Union.
"With all the talk of reducing direct aid payments, we need to find other mechanisms for seeing support gets into farmers pockets," says commodities director Wesley Aston.
The French land management contract, or contrat territoriau dexploitation, works by providing farmers with grant aid in return for specific socio-economic, environmental or animal welfare benefits.
Usually this takes the form of a lump sum to cover around 30% of the cost of investments needed to deliver these benefits and an annual payment to reward farmers for meeting certain working practices.
"One 200ha beef and arable farm we visited received about £36,360 over five years for environmental improvements," says Mr Aston. This was made up of £6610 for new machinery and £5950 a year for pollution control measures.
These involved establishing temporary grass leys, hedge planting and maintenance, manure composting, growing protein crops on set-aside land to prevent water run-off, planting mustard between harvest and sowing to absorb nitrates and the non-use of atrazine on certain areas.
"Total payments depend on farm size and there is a sliding scale in favour of the smaller units," says Mr Aston. "Average payments come to about 135,000 francs (£12,860) spread over five years, with extra aid provided if age, employment, co-operative or animal welfare conditions are met."
The scheme is open to both full-time and part-time farmers, as well as to co-ops or groups.
Applications are lodged with regional government bodies, which assess each project in terms of its viability and its contribution towards meeting the priority needs of the area. The farmer undertakes to meet a minimum set of conditions over five years.
"One big advantage of these contracts is they are eligible for additional national funding," says Mr Aston. "The UK is hampered by its historically low use of EU rural development funds, getting just 3% of the total budget. Given all the talk about sustainable farming, this is one way in which the government could actually deliver on its rhetoric." *
Douglas Rowe (right) and John Gilliland (centre) of the UFUtalk land management contracts in France.
Contrats Territoriaux
dExploitation
Land management contracts
• Total budget 3.45bn francs (£330m) over five years, part Brussels, part national.
• Average payment 135,000 francs (£12,860) a farm.
• Sliding scale of payments which favours small and medium holdings.
• Additional aid if age, employment, co-operative or animal welfare conditions are met.
• Payments made up of two parts – an investment grant of about 30% and an annual payment for meeting certain environmental objectives.
• To qualify, a farmer has to submit a five year plan, to deliver specific economic, employment, environmental or animal welfare benefits.
• The plan must include an economic/employment dimension and an environmental/land use dimension.
• Plans assessed by a regional agricultural policy committee.
• So far 12,000 contracts have been signed and another 6000 applied for, out of a targeted 50,000.