Almost 20% of a Waterford tillage farmer’s total farm profits have been “wiped out” by Minister for Agriculture Charlie McConalogue’s decision to suspend the straw chopping scheme for 2024.

Speaking on a special Irish Farmers Journal podcast The Last Straw, Pádraig Connery explained that the scrapping of the Straw Incorporation Measure represents a loss of one-fifth of his total farm income.

“At a figure of potentially €20/bale net profit, this farm might have €30,000 from straw sales, with €7,500 extra coming from the straw chopping scheme.

“In a bad year when grain might only break even, straw is your net profit for the whole farm. I’m looking at 20% of my straw profit wiped out with this announcement.

“In a bad year, that could mean 20% of total farm profit,” he said.

Connery had chopped his winter barley straw on Tuesday night in Clashmore, Co Waterford, prior to Minister McConalogue indicating he will move to suspend the scheme this year.

Patchy fields

The Waterford tillage farmer added that a February announcement by the Minister that patchy fields would still be eligible for the scheme in their entirety hugely influenced his decision to chop straw this year.

“I did a calculation based on if I got 200 bales from that field at a cost of €12/bale, my net profit from straw was about €2,600. I could get €2,400 from the chopping scheme.

“It was paid on every acre in the chopping scheme. I was only going to be paid for the straw that came out of the ‘good’ acres, we’ll call it,” he said.

Management decisions

On the lack of warning of this announcement, with the harvest kicking off around the country, Connery said months’ notice of the scheme being dropped would have been needed due to its influence on management decisions.

“Maybe I could have not chopped the winter barley, but I have 50ac of oaten straw in the scheme. With my agronomist, we planned to shorten that straw intentionally in anticipation of chopping.

“On spring oats, and maybe this is something that hasn’t been talked about, if I was planning on going to the market with that, I’d have left it long, I’d have risked it falling, because I would have needed the straw at maybe an eight bale/ac crop. It’s probably a five bale/ac crop.

“That’s not going to match the losses I’m looking at from that scheme being abandoned,” Connery added.

The Last Straw Podcast can be listened to in full here.