TAMS 'widely perceived to be failing as a scheme', ICMSA claims
The Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers' Association (ICMSA) has claimed that the Targeted Agricultural Modernisation Scheme (TAMS) is "widely perceived to be failing as a scheme".
Pat O'Brien, chairperson of the ICMSA Farm Business Committee, claimed that the scheme is "in danger of becoming the new ACRES", in reference to the Agri-Climate Rural Environment Scheme, which has been plagued by payment delays since it took effect in 2023.
According to O'Brien, ACRES is "widely accepted now to have failed due to underfunding and lack of focus".
He said that payment delays and funding constraints were the most notable source of frustration for farmer applicants to TAMS.
"It's not a good look when those who designed and are administering the schemes can’t even meet their own targets. If farmers missed these targets, they would be penalised, and the frustration on the ground is enormous," O'Brien said.
He called for more funding for TAMS to be secured.
"The Department of Public Expenditure must ensure that the funding is available immediately for timely TAMS payments.
"Minister Heydon, given the environmental benefits that the schemes were designed to achieve, must secure more funding for TAMS, it’s as simple as that," O'Brien said.
He also criticised the continued use of ranking and selection for applications in light of environmental obligations which will incur national fines if Ireland fails to hit them.
"We have the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council warning of potential enormous fines in 2030 on the basis of failure to ‘hit’ legal emissions reductions.
"Why then do we still have a situation where only 25% of solar funding is approved per tranche," the ICMSA farm business chair said.
"Approving 100% would both cut emissions in the present to short term, and lower the risk of these enormous national fines after 2023. It’s just the proverbial 'no brainer’ and we can’t understand how the Department [of Agriculture, Food and the Marine] can’t see that," he added.
"Not alone is it totally unfair that farmers are impeded from improving their farms from an environmental standpoint, there are animal husbandry, farm efficiency, and slurry storage ‘knock-ons’ here also.
"We fought tooth and nail to retain the nitrates derogation but then apply an 80% approval rate on storage tanks and penalise highly stocked farmers, the very farmers who need this infrastructure most.
"How will that help us secure the next derogation in three years’ time? It’s like asking the referee for a yellow card before the match," he remarked.
O'Brien called on the government to increase TAMS funding; pay farmers within Farmers' Charter timelines; and remove ranking and selection while fast-tracking approvals.
