Last Friday evening, weather-stricken farmers along the Mayo coast gathered at weather crisis meeting. The voice of the crowd centred on the need for support for farmers on the coast.

They said insufficient flood and storm barriers and the lack of any clear Government support from State agencies for badly affected farmers.

They also called on the Department of Agriculture and the NPWS for flexibility in the coming years.

IFA’s Padraic Joyce said that their sympathies are with families that have had their houses flooded and land damaged by the storms.

MEPs Jim Higgins and Marian Harkin also attended the meeting, highlighting the availability of the solidarity fund which can be accessed for disasters such as this.

Higgins said that Ireland should apply to the solidarity fund for financial aid. Currently the fund stands at €500m. He stressed that applying for the fund is straightforward. The application must contain a financial estimate of the cost of the damage and it must be received within 10 weeks of the disaster event.

Unfortunately, the level of damage caused by the disaster needs to be over €850m to be able to apply to the fund for assistance.

However, on a smaller scale it can be accessed on a regional basis. He added that the fund can not only be used to rectify damage, but could also be used for flood defences. Even if funding was available, farmers questioned the distribution of aid and called for a clear and transparent process.

IFA development officer Roy O’Brien said that after the first storm in late December and early January, IFA sent a survey to coastal farmers affected by the storm, in order to estimate the cost of the damage.

In total, 110 forms were returned showing an estimated cost of damage to be around €550,000.

This figure did not include the cost of lost area. O’Brien said that the Department of Agriculture could estimate the total area of agricultural land lost in coastal areas using satellite imagery. This could help in estimating the total cost of the storms.

Councillor Austin Francis suggested that Minister Simon Coveney should refrain from penalising coastal farmers on area inspections for several years, as many have lost grazable area in the past months.

He also called on the NPWS to allow farmers in these SAC areas more leniencies in rectifying storm damaged land and allow them to try and put barriers back in place.