Members of the Severely Disadvantaged Area Group (SDAG) and Northern Ireland Livestock Auctioneers met with Agriculture Minister, Michelle O’Neill at Stormont to hand over the petition which contained around 10,000 signatures expressing concern about specification pricing penalties being proposed by NIMEA.

Meanwhile, this week, the SDA have been holding meetings in Ederney, Derrygonnelly, Belleek and Florencecourt, to update farmers on CAP reform and also on the beef pricing structure being proposed by NIMEA, which represents the meat plants.

Peter Gallagher, Chairman of the Group stated: “A number of meetings have been held in various locations as an attempt to further educate farmers ahead of the deadline of May 2 for the transfer of entitlements as much confusion still remains.

“Farmers and landowners are understandably still very nervous about making decisions regarding the transfer of entitlements. The one month extension to the deadline which we achieved has given a chance for discussions to take place and although there is still a lot of guess work to any advice which is given at least now after talking to the decision makers we are in a good position to make a much more educated guess on how the SFP shall progress. We are therefore doing our best to offer one to one practical advice to each individual personal circumstance.

“With the likelihood of an immediate transition to single region quickly becoming the not so impossible situation as it may have once been perceived, it is understandable that the market for trading entitlements has become somewhat flat. However we would stress to all landowners who are not going to be active farmers to take action immediately and get all agreements in place prior to the May 2 deadline.