Farmers have been "left in limbo" because of the current situation with the Targeted Agricultural Modernisation Schemes (TAMS) a farm organisation warned today (Thursday, April 23).

According to Pat O’Brien, Farm Business committee chair of the Irish Creamery and Milk Suppliers Association (ICMSA) for many farmers TAMS is simply "impenetrable”.

O’Brien said: “TAMS really stands for Total Absolute Mayhem Scheme and that’s a damning indictment on a concept that could have played a crucial role transitioning farming towards a better environmental profile".

He said that the organisation has received "a huge number of calls from farmers who haven’t got in through the Rank and Selection process".  

“Farmers who worked extremely hard to build up their stock numbers are now left in limbo because they can’t access grant aid for slurry storage, solar and many other investment items," O'Brien also warned.

TAMS

The chair of the ICMSA Farm Business committee has also pointed to what he called the “crazy administrative Catch 22” that was applied to slurry storage.

He said: “The very farmers who want to build tanks to grant specification so that they will stand the test of time and they also need these tanks so that they can comply with the new storage requirements are the very cohort being penalised under Rank and Selection for their high stocking rate.

O’Brien said that that he does not know what the point is "of going around proclaiming that TAMS is a success when all the evidence proves otherwise".

"A farmer applying for solar has a one-in-10 chance of success," he added.’

O'Brien said:“We’d be happy to work with the department on getting this scheme someway operational and forward moving if they wanted.

"The very first thing we’d suggest is the public abandonment of the absurd and impenetrable Rank and Selection system they operate at present and which no-one can understand.”