IFA National Livestock Chairman Brendan Golden said IFA has put proposals to the Department of Agriculture to suspend the 5% production reduction requirement under the BEAM scheme as a result of the restrictions placed on farmers from COVID-19.
Brendan Golden said as marts are closed and not operating normally, the movement and value of stock is totally disrupted. It’s not reasonable for the Minister or the EU Commission to insist that farmers who participated in BEAM be forced to reduce their livestock numbers this year commencing from July 1st.
IFA has put this case to the Department of Agriculture requesting that the Minister would get the necessary sanction from the Commission in Brussels.
The terms and conditions of the BEAM Scheme state that participants must ‘reduce the production on the holding of bovine livestock manure nitrogen by 5% for the period 01 July 2020 to 30 June 2021 as compared with the period 01 July 2018 to 30 June 2019 as recorded on Department systems. Slurry exports are not reckonable as reduction’.
