All non-Teagasc farmers registered in Teagasc Knowledge Transfer (KT) discussion groups will be required to pay the Teagasc club fee for year two of the programme.

The €145 fee applies to farmers who have between one and 50 livestock units and farmers who did not pay the fee for year one have been issued with a bill of €290 for the two years of the programme.

KT leaflets handed out at discussion group meetings for year two of the programme show that Teagasc will be charging the €145 fee to non-Teagasc members.

ADVERTISEMENT

It is Teagasc policy that at KT discussion group members in any Teagasc-facilitated discussion group, must be paid-up clients of Teagasc, the leaflet reads.

“For year two of the KT discussion group scheme (August 2017 to July 2018), all group members will be charged the Teagasc club fee,” it said.

As revealed by the Irish Farmers Journal earlier this year, Teagasc issued bills of €145 to Teagasc KT group farmers who were not previously its clients. It then said that KT payments would be withheld until farmers payed the fee, but later rolled back on this.