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Further tranches of the Tier 1 Farm Business Improvement Scheme (FBIS) grant will be rolled out in NI, Agriculture Minister Edwin Poots has confirmed.
The third tranche of the scheme has a budget of £7.5m and opened to applications on Monday 2 November. Like previous versions of the scheme, it is again expected to be oversubscribed.
At Stormont this week, Minister Poots was asked about the scheme by his party colleague Keith Buchanan. “We intend to run that […] over the next number of years,” he said.
Tier 1 is funded by the Rural Development Programme (RDP) 2014-2020 and new guidance from DAERA states EU funds from the programme can be used up to the end of 2023.
Total EU funds for the RDP equated to €228m, but the latest official figures show that only €113m had been spent at the end of 2019.
Minister Poots indicated that he will also push for Stormont funds to be made available for future farm grant schemes.
“We could always do with a bit more money, so I will be looking to colleagues in the Department of Finance to assist us,” he said.
The rollout of a new tranche of Tier 2, for large scale building projects, with grant funding up to £250,000, is less certain.
Applications in the first tranche of Tier 2 faced long delays with planning permission due to concerns about ammonia emissions.
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