Any re-instatement of Areas of Natural Constraint (ANC) payments in NI should be funded from outside the existing agricultural budget, farmer representatives have said.

Sinn Féin MLA Declan McAleer is currently putting a private members bill through the NI Assembly which aims to set a “legal framework” for the ANC scheme to be restarted.

However, at Stormont last week, representatives from two farmer organisations made clear that ANC payments should not be funded by cutting other farm schemes.

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“Under no circumstances should ANC funding reduce, delay, top slice, displace or otherwise diminish any existing or planned support for farmers,” said Kellie McEvoy from the Ulster Farmers’ Union (UFU).

“We are in this business as farmers together. To start taking from one sector to give to another is not the way to go,” added Edward Adamson from the National Sheep Association.

During the meeting, McAleer told farmer representatives that his bill is about “setting the foundations” for reinstating ANC payments on severely disadvantaged area (SDA) land.

The proposal is that the exact details of a new £11m ANC scheme, including the funding source, would be addressed after next year’s Assembly elections.

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However, UFU president John McLenaghan suggested that a better approach would be to find available funding first, before plans for a new ANC scheme proceed.

“When we have the money, let’s sit down as an industry […] and we go through a consultation and co-design piece about how we get that distributed to where it’s most needed,” he said.

McLenaghan told MLAs that there were “all sorts of different funding” which could potentially be used to support a new ANC scheme.

He pointed out that the Soil Nutrient Health Scheme, Ruminant Genetics Project, and Carbon Calculator initiative were all funded from outside the £330m NI agriculture budget.

“If new money can’t be found, we can’t support the [ANC] bill as it currently is,” the UFU president said.