Over 34,000 agri-environmental actions to begin across Ireland
- Published on: 12 December 2024
- Last updated on: 15 April 2025
Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Charlie McConalogue, today announced that more than 34,000 environmental actions have been approved under the Agri-Climate Rural Environment Scheme (ACRES).
The activities, which are being carried out by more than 4,100 farmers across Ireland, are aimed at enhancing environmental integrity and improving biodiversity and water quality. Examples of the actions being funded by the department under the ACRES Non-Productive Investment (NPI) programme include the installation of bat boxes and nest boxes for barn owls and kestrels, the erection of gates and electric fencing to prevent over and under grazing, and the movement of water troughs to optimum locations.
A total of 4,148 farmers, or 96.7% of total applicants, will begin receiving confirmation today that their applications for Non-Productive Investments under the ACRES Co-Operation Scheme in 2023 were successful or partially successful.
Making the announcement, Minister McConalogue said:
“These investments are an integral element of ACRES that support farmers to take specific measures to enhance environmental outcomes on their holdings, and thereby increase their payments under the scheme. The 34,085 actions being undertaken by farmers all around Ireland are vital to maintaining environmental integrity and increasing biodiversity.”
Applications, in the form of NPI Annual Work plans, are prepared and submitted by ACRES advisors on behalf of their clients, who are ACRES Co-operation participants.
The Minister continued:
“Applications were submitted on behalf of 4,288 ACRES participants, with 43,896 individual NPIs included in the annual NPI work plans. These applications were then screened by the Cooperation Project teams, and their screening decisions have been submitted to the department.”
Decision letters will be available on AgFood from today. Hard copies will issue by post in the coming days. An ‘ACRES CP NPI-Annual Works Plan 2023 Approval Summary’ will also be uploaded on AgFood over the coming days, with the hard copies to issue in the post in January 2025. This summary will give the details of the approved NPIs, and will include maps, by parcel, showing the location of approved NPIs on the holding. The system to support the submission of claims and the processing of payments in respect of these approved investments will follow as early as possible in 2025.
The 2024 application window for Non-Productive Investments opened on 17 September 2024 and closed on 31 October 2024. The ACRES Co-operation Project Teams have commenced the screening of these applications.
Notes
The system for the submission of the first tranche of NPI Annual Work Plans formally opened on Thursday, 16 November 2023, and closed for submission of applications at 5.30pm on Wednesday, 6 December 2023.
The EU’s common agricultural policy (CAP) is a partnership between society and agriculture that ensures a stable supply of food, safeguards farmers’ income, protects the environment and keeps rural areas vibrant. EU countries implement the CAP 2023-27 with a CAP Strategic Plan at national level.
The Agri-Climate Rural Environment Scheme (ACRES) is co-funded by the European Union and the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine under Ireland’s CAP Strategic Plan for the period 2023-2027.
More information on the ACRES co-operation scheme is available on: gov.ie - Agri-Climate Rural Environment Scheme (ACRES).