Press Room

Commenting on the recent announcement by the Minister for Agriculture regarding the introduction of an adjusted Disadvantaged Area scheme to cover the growing of energy crops, Macra na Feirme national president Catherine Buckley said the extension of the scheme was a step in the right direction to encourage farmers to plant energy crops.

Farmer will now get paid the Disadvantaged Area payment minus the energy payment for land used for the production of willow and miscanthus energy crops up to a maximum of 10ha.

Ms Buckley said measures needed to be in place to ensure that farmers could meet future demand for energy crops and pointed out that her organisation had successfully lobbied for a number of measures to develop a biofuels industry, including the introduction of planting and harvesting grants for energy crops, energy payment top-ups and Rural Environment Protection Scheme payments.

"However, the extension of the Disadvantaged Area scheme to cover the growing of energy crops should be a stand alone payment and not adjusted to take account of the energy payment," she said.

"Macra believe both the Disadvantaged Area scheme and the energy payment should be paid to farmers to encourage them to plant these crops and we lobbied for this in our most recent pre-budget submission," she said.

Under the European Directive on the promotion of the use of biofuels, member states are recommended to substitute a minimum of 2% by 2005 and 5.75% by 2010 of transport and heating fuels with biofuels and other alternative fuels.

"There is a need for a more long term commitment to create further certainty in support measures for growers and the development of supply chains as recognised in the White paper," she said.