Farmers in Carlow and Kilkenny and indeed throughout the entire country could lose millions in grant aid under the Farm Waste
Managment Scheme if their development work is not completed before the end of the year deadline.
And in spite of numerous pleas by both the ICMSA and the IFA along with a number of opposition TDs, the Government has remained silent on whether or not it will extend the deadline or not.
Many farmers are convinced that it will be practically impossible to
complete the work on their farms before December 31 next because of the very wet conditions during the summer months. In many areas the farm development work came to a complete stop because of the very wet weather. it has also been revealed that many dairy farmers are way behind with their development work because many of them were waiting for the winter months to commence at a time when they would have the cows dried off. They will have little or no chance of having their work completed before the December deadline.
In all more then 20,000 farmers across the country have been approved for funding under the Farm Waste Managment Scheme which appears to be a greater number then the Government had expected. And a number of farmers who have been approved to commence the work have been issued with a second written reminder that the work must be completed before the end of the year.
The entire situation leaves many farmers very worried because they are now very unsure about the grants being payed out if they do not meet what is in some cases an impossible deadline. Banks are also putting these same farmers under pressure for repayments, some of which would have been repayed in the form of the grants once the completed work had been inspected.
Both the ICMSA and IFA leaders have pointed out to the Government on numerous occasions in the recent past that many construction jobs will be lost mainly in rural areas if the December deadline of the Farm Waste Managment Scheme is not extended. In fact the scheme has been the mainstay of the construction industry over the past year, when the building of houses and industrial work came to a standstill.
As it stands all this work will end in a few months time and with
silence from the government we can only say that it does not appear to be too worried at this time. However, all farmers who have
completed investment work in accordance with the terms and conditions of the scheme will be paid their full entitlements.
