Ireland was warned yesterday that it must supply much more information to the EU on the environmental impact of the Rural Environment Protection Scheme to ensure its continuation.
A senior EU Commission official told a Teagasc conference in Wexford that Ireland had supplied only one report to Europe on the effectiveness of the scheme and that one dealt with archaeological monuments which were not a paid part of the scheme.
Mr Frank Fay, the EU co-ordinator of the scheme, under which farmers are paid for farming in an environmentally sensitive way, said the Commission had received 157 reports on REPS from other countries taking part, thus fulfilling their legal obligations.
He said there was extreme pressure from the European Parliament to see good evaluations of the agri-environmental regulations covering the scheme.
The EU Budget Committee was looking at the 1999 budget and was proposing to put a substantial amount into reserve without evaluation.
"The Iversen report has been quite critical of the progress made in evaluation although it admits that a certain amount of environmental benefits are evident," he said.
The Commission had produced a detailed evaluation document based on reports from memberstates. "We have received 158 reports detailing some solid environmental gains from the programmes", he said.
"In the case of Ireland, we received a very good report on historic monuments, which is one of the conditions of REPS. However, for the rest of it, we know a lot of good work is going on but we have not yet received any environmental evaluation reports."
Ireland had a legal obligation to provide such reports and then it was up to the programme managers to take an informed view on the way forward from 2000.
He said the monitoring detail of the scheme was well known but the scientific information had to be supplied as well so the 1.5 billion ecus spent on it could be seen to have been well spent.
Mr Joe Hall, a countryside management specialist with Teagasc, told the 300 people at the conference that participation in the scheme did not represent what he termed "second-division farming". Two award-winning farmers in Ireland were in REPS, he said.
Mr Hall said there were now almost 40,000 farmers taking part in the scheme, which pays up to £5,000 a year for entering into a contract to farm in an environmentally sensitive way.
He said that between 1995 and 1999, farmers would have received almost £500 million from the scheme, which now operates on almost 25 per cent of Irish farms.
"The most striking success is that over 20,000 farmers have already completed training courses and this has greatly enhanced appreciation of the environment."
Environmental impact studies were being carried out and a a major one, looking at the impact of the scheme on flora and fauna, was due early in the new year. He warned that all supports for farming in the future were likely to be contingent on farmers running their farms in accordance with strict environmental standards.