This article is from page 18 of the 2011-11-15 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 18 JPG
AN EXTRA € 1 million will be pumped into the north Clare economy over the next two years with the news that the Burren Farming for Conservation project will now run until December of 2013.
The project, which is worth € 1 million each year to almost 150 Burren farm families, has been given an extra year of grants funding by the Department of Agriculture, however, administration funding to cover the roll-out for the scheme for the extra has yet to be confirmed.
The lion’s share of the money granted to the project’s farmers will be spent locally to cover the cost of on-farm environmental works such as stone-wall building, scrub removal and water infrastructure – to enable the grazing of non-profitable sections of the Burren. Because of this, the funding is likely to have a massive knock-on effect in the local community with local labourers and suppliers also to benefit.
The future of the project, which was officially recognised this year as Europe’s top Life Farming Project, is still unsure beyond 2014. Grant funding from the project is currently sourced directly from the Department of Agriculture through unclaimed Single Farm Payments (SFP), while the project team is funded by the National Parks and Wildlife Service.
“The project is now going to run to four years. The funding for this is linked to CAP so as long as the CAP stays in place we should have enough funding to see us through until then,” said project co-ordinator Brendan Dunford.
“We don’t see the project ending after four years. Once this section of funding is completed, we hope to be in an even stronger position to get funding for the future because of the positive results that we have been producing. Once we can show measurable results, there is no reason why we should not continue to get funded after the CAP reforms.”
This project has grown from the pilot BurrenLIFE Projects, which was ran in the Burren between 2005 and 2010. The project, which involved 20 local life-farmers, was Ireland’s first farming for conservation project.
The project has grown from these original 20 farmers to almost 150 with more farm families being added this year.
“We began last year with 117 farmers but this year, because of an under spend, we have been able to increase that to 143 farmers, right across the Burren. The farmers stretch all the way from Doolin up to Kinvara and down as far as Corofin, so we have a great geographical spread,” continued Brendan.
“We need to make sure that every euro spent represents value for money. So the farmers receive some funding to pay for small infrastructure projects which can help to improve farm management but the lions share of funding goes toward a field-byfield assessment of each field. So the farmers get rated and paid by how well they manage their fields.
“So if the farmers put the work in then they will get paid for it, but if they are not bothered then they won’t be getting any money out of it. This year we will rate about 1,000 fields from all over the Burren.”