Actions are available to farmers to address environmental issues on the farm, directly contribute to environmental objectives or increase the farmers capacity to improve field scores through management.
NPIs are applied for by the farm advisor in an NPI-Annual Works Plan (AWP). Landscape Actions are recommended by the Co-operation Project (CP) team in a Landscape Action-Annual Works Plan (LA-AWP). The actions are submitted through the GLAMS mapping system maintained by the Dept. of Agriculture, Food, and the Marine (DAFM).
Non-Productive Investments (NPIs)
Non-Productive Investments
NPI window: Each year in the autumn the GLAM portal will open for advisors to start creating NPI-Annual Work Plans. This could involve walking the farm with the participant and discussing what NPI actions would be most appropriate either to address environmental issues on the farm or increase the capacity to improve field scores through management. The agreed NPIs will then be drawn on GLAMS and submitted before the closing date (end October).
Screening: Once NPIs have been submitted and checked they are sent to the CP team who will screen the actions and either approve or reject. Authorisation for approved NPI actions is from the date of issue of the NPI-AWP Approval letter. No works should be carried out by the participant until they receive their approval letter for the relevant year. DAFM reserves the right to carry out inspections, audits, assessments, research, monitoring, and evaluation at reasonable times for NPIs on lands farmed by participants which can include after the ACRES contracts ends.
Funding for NPIs, LAs and Landscape Bonus Payments
The total maximum budget for an ACRES CP participant over the 5-year contract is €52,500 (5 x €10,500).
A maximum budget of €7,000 per year is available for ACRES CP Core Payment. ‘Core Payment’ is the sum of all ACRES CP results - based payments plus ACRES General Action payments.
An additional NPI/LA fund of €17,500 (€3,500 x 5) is available for NPIs/LAs/Landscape Bonus over the 5-years of the contract.
Where a farmer does not claim up to the maximum €7,000 core payment ceiling in any year of the ACRES contract, the balance of unclaimed funds are added to the total NPI/LA/Landscape Bonus fund for that participant. This ensures that famers who don’t achieve a score of 8, but who were restricted on payments they could receive from ACRES General actions due to the ring-fencing rule (and organic farmers who only receive reduced payment for scores of 8/9/10), will have the ability to get the full €52,500 ACRES payment over the 5-year contract.
Where NPI’s are approved, payment will be limited to the remaining fund ceiling for that participant. The total maximum budget of €52,500 will not be exceeded.
Maximum ceilings for Registered Farm Partnerships shall be the maximum outlined above multiplied by the number of holdings, up to a maximum of 3.
Where an investment has been grant aided under TAMS or any other National/EU funded Agri-environment or Capital Investment Scheme from 01 January 2018, this cannot fulfil any part of the requirement of an ACRES NPI action. Entrants in the Organic Farming Scheme (OFS) should refer to the table, showing interaction between NPI actions and OFS, as OFS payments may be foregone where specific NPI actions are claimed on the same parcel to avoid double funding.
Double Funding
Completion of Work and Claims for Payment
The claim for payment can only be made online. Only one claim for payment is allowed per approved NPI - Annual Works Plan. A claim for payment can only be submitted once NPIs are completed/established/installed as per specification and by any completion date applicable.
Any unclaimed NPIs from an NPI-AWP are no longer active but can be reapplied for in subsequent application windows. Once a participant receives their NPI - AWP Approval letter, they have until the 31st December the following year to submit their claim for payment.
The table below outlines certain NPIs that are time sensitive. If the NPI-AWP is approved (by the issue of NPI-AWP Approval Letter) on or before 15th May, it is taken that the applicable NPI will be delivered in that year, unless withdrawn before the date specified below for the action or before any notification of inspection. If approval is issued after 15th May, that NPI can only be delivered the following year and the same rules of withdrawal apply.
Ring Fencing Rule
The ring-fencing calculation will determine if General actions will be eligible for payment and how much money an ACRES CP participant can receive for General actions in each year of the ACRES contract. The only action the ring-fencing rule doesn’t apply to is Conservation of Rare Breeds.
€7,000 minus (Total claimed area of owned/leased/rented commonage declared in 2022 BPS (or 2023 for Tranche 2 participants) multiplied by €145 plus Total claimed area of CP parcels declared as owned Permanent Pasture, LIPP and THM in 2022 BPS multiplied by €300).
Example A: Farmer with 43 ha of land declared in 2022 BPS:
a. 5 ha (Claimed area) commonage
b. 8 ha (claimed area) of owned CP zone land declared as permanent pasture
c. 30 ha of privately owned land outside of CP zone
Funds available for payment from General actions = €7,000 minus (a. x €145 + b. x €300)
5 x €145= €725 (Commonage at a rate of €145/ha)
8 x €300= €2,400 (Grassland at a rate of €300/ha)
Total: €3,125
€7,000 less €3,125 ring-fenced for Commonage and CP zone results-based payments leaves €3,875 of funding available for general actions. LESS and Conservation of Rare Breeds are considered whole farm actions so can also be chosen at farm level. The only action that can be chosen on CP parcels declared as owned Permanent Pasture, LIPP and THM in 2022 BPS is Traditional stone wall maintenance. All General actions can be chosen on the remaining LPIS parcels once they meet the requirements for the respective actions.
Below is a list of all NPIs available for farmers to choose from. The final table shows the NPIs allowed on LPIS with ACRES General Actions.
