“ICSA patience with the Department has run out and it simply is not good enough to leave so many farmers high and dry over IT issues or minor technicalities with plans,” said Kent. Around 10,000 farmers have experienced delays with GLAS payments, while 2,500 others are awaiting AEOS funds after completing the scheme. The ICSA estimated the money owed to farmers under those schemes as of Monday to be €46m.

Some farmers are behind with bank repayments as a result

“Farmers entered the scheme in good faith, hired planners to submit plans and incurred costs,” said ICSA rural development chair Seamus Sherlock. “They entered the scheme in the expectation that they would be paid in December and many are under pressure with bills. Some farmers are behind with bank repayments as a result and many more are experiencing cashflow difficulties.”

Following the protest, Kent, Sherlock and ICSA general secretary Eddie Punch met senior Department officials, who acknowledged the hardship caused by delayed payments and told them that 1,200 farmers were to be paid on Monday.

The organisation contrasted the tight deadlines imposed on farmers to enter GLAS with the delays in obtaining payment and called for a review of the tendency by the Department to make schemes more and more complex without adequate systems and resources to manage them.

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