Farmers unimpressed by Budget measures
Farm bodies were "underwhelmed" by yesterday's Budget ’26, dismissing it as a "non-event".
The IFA President Francie Gorman said the farming measures "are decidedly underwhelming" in the context of the increasing cost of doing business in Ireland, which has not been addressed.
Francie Gorman said the Minister for Agriculture confirmed to him that there would be no reductions in the beef and sheep schemes.
“Concerns of cuts to these schemes have been alleviated but farmers will be very disappointed that they have not been increased in line with pre-election commitments,” he said.
“While the funding of €157m for TB is essential to deal with the very severe impact on farmers, the increased allocation is a result of the increasing value of livestock lost to disease and the Department’s failure to invest in dealing with the root cause of disease spread,” he said.
“Securing funding to tackle this issue is important, but it must be targeted towards a wildlife control programme and the Minister must move to lift the ceilings for the live valuation scheme immediately,” he said.
On TB Eradication Programme funding the ICSA's Sean McNamara said it is vital that farmer representatives are fully consulted on how this money will be spent.
“The first priority must be to increase the outdated compensation caps. The current ceilings of €3,000 for commercial animals and €5,000 for pedigree animals are totally unrealistic. ICSA has been calling for these to be increased to €5,000 and €7,000 respectively, and this must happen now without delay.
"Farmers with top-quality breeding stock are not being fairly compensated for their losses, and this is undermining livelihoods across the country. TB eradication is an important national goal, but it cannot come at the expense of low-income beef and suckler farmers.”
Mr McNamara welcomed the retention of the National Beef and Sheep Welfare Schemes but said the momentum towards delivering €300 per suckler cow and €35/ewe should have been maintained, not stalled.
“It is vital that these scheme payment rates are at least maintained at 2025 levels, with €13/ewe in the Sheep Welfare Scheme, delivering a potential €25/ewe when combined with the Sheep Improvement Scheme. Likewise, the €75/hd under the Beef Welfare Scheme must continue, maintaining the €250 per cow/calf achievable when combined with SCEP. These schemes are vital to sustaining family farm incomes, but farmers needed to see progress, not just a holding pattern.”
IFA Farm Business Chair Bill O’Keeffe said that the renewal of the various tax reliefs was very important, but some of the taxation changes will be costly for farmers.
“The reduction in the flat rate addition for VAT will cost farmers over €61m this year. Farm families will also be disappointed with the failure to lift the tax bands,” he said.
The decision to kick the RZLT issue down the road continues the uncertainty for those farmers impacted by this fundamentally unfair tax.
“The Government must exempt land being actively farmed from this penal tax,” he said.