Almost €1 billion in cheques will arrive at the homes of 130,000 Irish farmers tomorrow when they receive their Single Farm Payment.
The payout, which will replace all previous payments, was finalised in the Department of Agriculture over the weekend for posting today.
Last night, Minister for Agriculture Mary Coughlan, met the team which had printed up the cheques over the weekend for dispatch to the farmers.
Ms Coughlan described the Single Farm Payment as "historic" and said Ireland was the first EU country to get it in place.
The largest single payment will be over half a million euro and the average payment to farmers will be in the region of €13,000.
The amount is based on an average of what farmers had received from the EU in payments in the years 2000, 2001 and 2002 and who will continue to farm in 2005.
It is part of the reform of the Common Agricultural Policy (Cap) which breaks the links between farm production and farm supports.
The farmers who receive the payments need not milk a cow, keep an animal or till a field but they must keep their land in good agricultural condition, under the terms of the new agricultural policy.
John Kehoe, who is in charge of getting the cheques out to the farmers, said his staff had worked all weekend to ensure they met the December 1st deadline.
"About 40 per cent of them will be getting a payment slip, not a cheque, because they opted for electronic transfer because they feared a postal strike."
The Minister said she hoped that when the cheques arrive, farmers will have received just over €1.8 billion since January 1st last.