The Single Payment Scheme was replaced by the Basic Payment Scheme and Greening Payment in 2015. The Greening Payment is an important part of the CAP following the Reform that was agreed during the Irish Presidency in June 2013. The Greening Payment will amount to approximately 30% of the overall payment made to farmers under the new Regime. The three main elements of the greening requirements are as follows:
- Crop Diversification;
- Ecological Focus Areas;
- Protection of Permanent Grassland including sensitive grassland.
As the protection of permanent grassland will be applied at national level, the main two measures that will impact on farmers are Crop Diversification and Ecological Focus Areas (EFA). The farmers involved are arable growers, who will declare 10 hectares or more of arable land in 2015. Bearing in mind the complex nature of the requirements, my Department has built an on-line application facility, which will assist farmers in applying for payments under the Basic Payment Scheme and Greening Payment. Under the EFA requirements, I decided that the following landscape features and areas could be utilised by farmers in Ireland:
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Hedgerows
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Nitrogen Fixing Crops (Protein crops)
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Drains
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Catch Crops
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Buffer Strips
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Short Rotation Coppice
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Field copses
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Land lying fallow
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BPS Eligible Forestry
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The three landscape features are hedgerows, drains and buffer strips. The others are area-related measures and can be declared as such by applicants, who select one or more of these options in their 2015 Basic Payment Scheme/Greening Payment application. My Department, using datasets from Ordnance Survey Ireland (OSi) and other software applications, established a database of hedgerows, drains and buffer strips for use by applicants in the on-line application. As these features were identified by electronic means, they will, of course need to be checked and verified by applicants and their advisors/consultants. When the data is verified, the on-line facility will provide applicants with the EFA contribution of each feature in all land parcels declared. The on-line application will also inform farmers whether they are compliant or not with the greening requirements based on the area details declared by them. In addition to the updating of the data by applicants and their agents, the database will be updated by the findings of eligibility inspection undertaken in 2015 and subsequent years.
With a view to assisting arable farmers and providing as much information as is possible to them before they submit their 2015 application, my Department will issue a complete set of maps outlining the landscape features in each parcel together with a comprehensive Guidance Manual to all arable farmers next week.
My Department has worked closely, and continues to do so, with the farming organisations, Teagasc and the Agricultural Consultants Association together with individual arable farmers in developing the application process in Ireland.
