Payments totalling £14.7m have been made to 8,119 applicants to the Areas of Natural Constraint (ANC) scheme, DAERA has announced.

Payments are made on Severely Disadvantaged Area (SDA) designated land at a rate of £56.47/ha for the first 200ha claimed and £42.35/ha thereafter.

The Department has said that the first payments under the 2017 ANC scheme were made on 13 March and the target is to pay 95% of eligible claims by 31 March.

Around 9,500 applications were received for the 2017 ANC scheme with approximately 8,800 applications eligible for payments.

On enquiry, a DAERA spokesperson said that the majority of ineligible claims were due to farmers not meeting the minimum stocking rate required of 0.2 livestock units per hectare between 1 April and 31 October 2016.

Other ineligible cases are because of late applications or businesses not claiming the minimum requirement of 3ha of SDA land. “The eligibility of a small number of cases is still being assessed,” the spokesperson added.

The budget for the 2017 ANC payment is £20m, but this is to fall to £8m next year, which is due to be the last year of the scheme.

That has been described as a “body blow” by Ulster Farmers’ Union hill farming chair, Ian Buchanan.

“DAERA believes a modest increase in Basic Payment to severely disadvantaged areas will offset the loss of ANC payments. In reality this could not be further from the truth,” said Buchanan. He points out that not all farms in the SDA gain under the move to flat-rate payments, while other farmers have seen their agri-environment schemes end, and have a long wait before the new Environmental Farming Scheme kicks in.

In its 2016 ANC consultation, DAERA highlighted that between 2008 and 2013, SDA farms were £115/ha worse off than lowland farms.

The UFU wants these figures to be updated to take account of planned changes in support.

“Farms in hill areas make a major contribution to our economy, the environment and wider rural community. DAERA officials cannot ignore these harsh economic facts – and when devolution returns this has to be a priority for the new minister,” said Buchanan.