Farmers should be paid for nature restoration measures says minister

Farmers should be paid for targeted measures that will help Ireland achieve the ambitious goals set out in the Nature Restoration Law (NRL), Minister for State Christopher O’Sullivan has told the Irish Farmers Journal.

Farmers will hopefully be “biting our hands off” to get into such schemes, Minister O’Sullivan claimed.

“I am very focused on finding a way to help farmers in the long term with new payment schemes for targeted measures that help us achieve our goals for nature restoration,” Minister O’Sullivan said.

“Of course, these [schemes] will be voluntary, but my hope is that farmers will be biting our hands off," he added.

"It’s vital that these kinds of schemes are designed in a way that simplifies and streamlines things and that they value local knowledge and expertise,” he maintained.

Land clarification

Minister O’Sullivan - who is junior minister at the Department of Housing and Local Government, with responsibility for nature, heritage and biodiversity - also clarified recent comments that he wanted the State to purchase up to 10,000ha a year to extend the total area of high nature value land in public ownership.

While Minister O’Sullivan reiterated that he would like to see a further 40,000ha of land being farmed for nature by 2030, he pointed out that much of this expansion could be delivered by utilising lands already in public ownership and primarily held by Bord na Móna and Coillte.

He claimed that farming partnerships involving land owners and agencies such as the National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS) could also provide some of the 40,000ha target.

“It’s no secret that my ambitions for nature in this country are big and that I want to see more high nature value land being managed for biodiversity, which includes increasing the size and number of our national parks and nature reserves,” Minister O’Sullivan commented.

“This is a commitment in the Programme for Government and it’s my job to deliver on it,” he pointed out.

“However, it is not my view that this should come exclusively from the private market. When I think about acquisitions, I am thinking about partnerships and long-term leases, as well as ownership, and in particular about public lands held by other State bodies that are being prioritised for nature rather than economic productivity,” Minister O’Sullivan explained.

“I’m also thinking about private landowners who may choose to approach the NPWS to ensure that the high nature value land they own is managed for nature in perpetuity,” he added.

Scope

President of the Irish Natura and Hill Farmers Association (INHFA) Pheilim Molloy welcomed Minister O’Sullivan’s clarification.

“There is scope there to farm these environmentally sensitive lands in a manner which is beneficial for the farmer, the environment and the wider rural community,” he said.

Molloy maintained that partnerships and collaborations between the NPWS and landowners should be targeted at young farmers.

The INHFA president also called for the State to utilise one of its hill properties as an uplands farming research facility.

“The results coming out of the uplands research farm in Glenwherry in Antrim have shown that farming is beneficial from a habitat and biodiversity point of view. If there was a proper uplands research facility in the 26 counties, we’d be getting this information first hand,” Molloy said.