EU farm ministers will reopen talks this afternoon to resolve a bitter split over how to reform Europe's Common Agricultural Policy (CAP).
The Minister for Agriculture, Mr Walsh, is attending the talks, which may continue throughout the week.
A spokesman for the Department of Agriculture said a "compromise document" is due to be presented to ministers when the talks resume at 3 p.m. today.
The Irish Farmers' Association (IFA) has objected to the so-called decoupling proposals, which are intended to break the link between payments from Europe and the level of production on farms.
However, the Irish Cattle and Sheep Farmers' Association (ICSA) said today it is committed to supporting EU Agriculture Commissioner Mr Franz Fischler's proposals for full decoupling.
ICSA president Mr John Deegan said any sort of partial decoupling would be "an absolute disaster" for Irish farmers.
At an emergency meeting of the ICSA national executive in Portlaoise last night, over 75 per cent of members said they would either remain at existing levels of production or increase production if subsidies were fully decoupled from production.
The marathon talks on CAP reform broke up without agreement last week. However, today the 15 ministers enter a final showdown with the plan's chief architect, Mr Fischler. Diplomats say the likelihood of a deal this week is high.
Additonal reporting Reuters