Minister McConalogue announces launch of Results Based Environment-Agri Pilot Project (REAP)

The Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Charlie McConalogue T.D., has today announced the opening of the Results-Based Environment-Agri Pilot Project (REAP). This pilot is one of the transitional measures for Irish farming using the additional funding secured by the Minister this year for environmental initiatives. It is designed to pilot some measures now for possible inclusion later under the next CAP measures for Ireland from 2023 onwards.

“REAP is an ambitious, innovative and exciting new pilot programme. My very clear aim coming into 2021 for farming and the environment was two-fold - to roll-over our existing agri-environment schemes to give farmers certainty and to pilot new initiatives. I’m hugely excited about this REAP project as it helps us and farmers identify value we can bring to our next national agri-environmental scheme by trialing some measures now. It will identify the environmental and biodiversity returns from specific farm measures while delivering a key new incomes to farmers.”

“It’s the first time we have scaled up results-based environmental farming to this level and it will help incentivise farmers to deliver for the environment by ensuring that those with the best environmental scores receive the highest pay. The project will also support farm incomes by providing up to €12,600 to participating farms over the two-year term of their REAP contract.”

“This measure complements very well the existing agri-environment measures such as GLAS, Organics and EIPs all of which we have continued in 2021 to give farmers certainty during this transitional period. I secured an 11% increase in the Department’s funding as part of Budget 2021 to ensure that GLAS could continue for those farmers while delivering innovative pilot measures such as REAP.

“This record level of investment in on-farm agri-environment measures shows the commitment of this Government to achieving our goals of achieving our environmental ambition while investing in farm incomes. I would encourage any eligible farmer to apply and I look forward to working with all stakeholders on this initiative as we develop our schemes for the next CAP.”