Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine Martin Heydon has told Agriland the new €100 million Fuel Subsidy Support Scheme will be "in place very quickly".

The scheme, part of the government's latest fuel support package announced on Sunday (April 12), aims to help farmers, agricultural contractors and fishers who are facing unprecedented increases in fuel costs.

"This is very much a standalone fuel subsidy scheme with the clear intention of delivering a subsidy of up to 20c/L on green diesel," the minister said.

Scheme

The government announcement followed fuel protests across the country.

However, Minister Heydon said he had been working on the measure "for a number of weeks now" since the first government package came out.

"I was very clear and government was very clear, [that] the first intervention wouldn't be the last," he said.

The initial €250 million package saw a 3c/L cut in excise duty for green diesel. A further 2.4c/L reduction was applied following a vote in the Dáil last night.

The government has extended temporary measures to reduce excise duty on petrol, diesel and green diesel from the end of May to the end of July.

Fuel

Minister Heydon said was working with the Association of Farm Contractors in Ireland (FCI) and the farm organisations in recent weeks to design a fuel scheme and develop a working group for contractors.

The first major meeting of the working group, which was a commitment of the Programme for Government, will be on Monday, April 20.

Minister Heydon said that by securing a significant amount of money for the agriculture sector, he had one of two options available to him.

"One would be replicate a previous scheme like the fodder scheme and pay farmers directly on a per hectare basis just to get money out very, very quickly.

"Or the other was to have a targeted scheme that would take a little bit of time to design, but that would be based on usage of diesel and on energy.

"So on that basis, that will take a little bit longer and it will take a couple of months to get this money out to farmers," he said.

Scheme

Minister Heydon added: "To be really clear here, we're designing a scheme that will be very straightforward".

"It will have one single point of application. It will be based on the farmer or contractor's fuel usage in 2025.

"It will be paid out across the five months of March to the end of July because this is the most intensive time of the year for burning green diesel," he said.

In response to concerns that the scheme could result in delayed payments to farmers similar to the Agri-Climate Rural Environment Scheme (ACRES), Minister Heydon said: "This is not comparable in any way to other schemes like that".

Minister Heydon said the subsidy of up to 20c/L under the scheme, combined with the excise cuts, will effectively mean a reduction of 27.4c/L on green diesel over five "critical" months for farmers and farm contractors.

"But obviously, this is a new scheme designed from scratch that I've been working on for a number of weeks now to be able to have it as an option to put in place," he said.

Contractors

Minister Heydon said the scheme allows contractors to be able to "send a clear message to the banks and the lending institutions".

"The concern here was around the credit extended to contractors would come under serious pressure when their diesel bill was increasing by €70,000 or €80,000 compared to last year.

"On that basis, the extension of credit is something that in most circumstances will be recognised because they know the money is coming," he said.

The minister said the government supports would be worth up to €274 on 1,000 litres of green diesel.

"It will make a really meaningful difference, particularly for those who are high energy users in the ag space," he said.