It was a rare acknowledgment at Government level of the impacts that excessive grazing has, particularly from sheep, on the hills. In his post, O\u2019Sullivan acknowledged that \u201cupland farmers are vital to maintaining healthy ecosystems\u201d and that \u201cfarmers are up for the task of restoring nature\u201d, adding that he wanted to see them rewarded for \u201cdoing the right thing\u201d. <\/p>\n
Upland farmers, like farmers across the country, are dependent upon the subsidy system, steered by the EU\u2019s Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) which delivers approximately \u20ac3 billion of public money to the sector every year. Farmers in receipt of this money must follow the terms and conditions and in upland areas these have generally failed to incentivise doing the right thing. <\/p>\n
For instance, the \u20ac1.3 billion Forestry Programme, which was launched in 2022, explicitly excluded any land over 300m in the west of Ireland and 400m in the east. Anywhere with a peat depth over 30cm is excluded and while there is a good reason for this, as bogs are not appropriate for plantations, it disregards the benefits of naturally regenerating trees on peat soil. In essence, upland farmers are frozen out of forest grants. <\/p>\n
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Minister for Nature Christopher O’Sullivan drew attention to the issue of over-grazed upland habitats in an Instagram post earlier this year <\/p>\n
That leaves continued sheep farming as the only source of income, which creates a problem. <\/p>\n
The report to the Commission noted that \u201cintensive grazing or overgrazing by livestock\u201d was a high impact on upland habitat and included a particularly pointed quote from a National Parks and Wildlife Service staff member that \u201call of the designated peatland habitats in west Galway and southwest Mayo are under pressure from overgrazing by sheep … This pressure is widespread and intensive in nature and by far the greatest pressure on, and threat to, the integrity and proper functioning of this habitat\u201d. <\/p>\n
If this is to change, it must be through how subsidies are paid to farmers. These can take the form of incentives for the things society wants (doing the right thing) and penalties for things that are deemed to be unacceptable: burning, overgrazing or deliberate habitat damage. <\/p>\n
Every farmer in receipt of subsidies must conform to minimum standards of \u201cgood agricultural and environmental condition\u201d, or GAEC. There are a number of GAEC measures and, according to the Department of Agriculture, the objective of GAEC2 is \u201cto protect wetlands and peatlands\u201d. <\/p>\n
Fintan Kelly is senior land use officer with the Irish Environmental Network. He authored a submission to the Department on the measures under GAEC2 and suggested that they should discourage draining, burning, turf-cutting and grazing of blanket bogs during winter months and that \u201ccomplete destocking [removal of livestock] should be considered where peatland areas have shown no improvement following management\u201d. <\/p>\n
Kelly says that, because Ireland has so much peatland, \u201cif we could bring in a base level that would protect peat soil, that would have a really positive impact on the environment and the sustainability of farming\u201d. <\/p>\n
However, he says now that the process \u201cwas a complete waste of everyone\u2019s time \u2013 all it did was aggravate farmers, cause a huge amount of distress and create paranoia around peat soil\u201d. <\/p>\n
He says regulation is needed \u201cto ensure that there are certain practices that are so unsustainable or antisocial that they shouldn\u2019t be happening\u201d, but for nature restoration \u201cwe can\u2019t get to ambitious action through regulation alone … we can only do that through incentives.\u201d <\/p>\n
Incentives, or payments to farmers for measures that go beyond the minimum requirements, have been around since the 1990s, but we have very little to show for them, chiefly because they have been based on general actions that can be applied to any farm anywhere, rather than tailored measures designed to deliver a particular outcome. <\/p>\n
The latest round of the CAP applies a new formula that pays farmers for results rather than actions and has been applying this to large areas of upland. <\/p>\n
According to a paper looking at this change of approach and published in the journal, Agricultural Systems<\/a>, Ireland\u2019s application of these results-based agri-environmental payment schemes is now \u201cEurope\u2019s largest\u201d. Among the advantages, the paper says, is that \u201cfarmers retained autonomy and flexibility over their farm management and were actively involved in decision-making\u201d, while \u201cempirical data shows improvements in habitat quality [\u2026] as well as benefits for non-target species\u201d. <\/p>\n