Long-term financial commitments from Government are needed to match the ambitions when it comes to nature restoration, an IFA public meeting in Killarney, Co Kerry, has heard.

Calling for new ringfenced funding to be put in place and guaranteed until 2050, Paul O’Brien, IFA’s regional chair for south Leinster, said “farmers entering future nature restoration projects should do so only on a voluntary basis”.

He added that no new designation should take place, at least in the first phase of the plan.

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Along with funding, farmer concerns were centred around their experiences of existing land designations, such as Special Areas for Conservation (SACs) and Special Protected Areas (SPAs), that were introduced as part of the habitats directive in 1997.

What happened in 1997 was continuously returned to as a reference point, and as some contributors pointed out the money ran out for them, but the designations and bureaucracy remained in place.

The example of REPS being the among the first schemes cut following the economic crash in 2008 was also mentioned as an example of farmers’ lack of trust in long-term environmental funding.

Áinle Ní Bhríain from the National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS) highlighted that the current consultation process allows farmers to make submissions and encouraged them to do so.

A second consultation is expected to take place a year from now with the publication of the nature restoration strategy expected in September 2027.

Fears regarding the legal implications of what would be entailed were raised on the night, along with a number of them focusing on the presence of the word “law” in nature restoration law.

The NPWS representative pointed out that: “It’s not a law, it’s a regulation. The word law has been attached to it in popular conversation.”

Regarding this, she suggested that the IFA should change their title slides for the meetings.