If you are one of over 1,000 farmers across Northern Ireland who received free soil sampling and analysis reports and have not already taken up the offer of training, now is the time to act.
The programme, which was facilitated by the Agri-Food and Bioscience Institute (AFBI), is part of the EU Exceptional Adjustment Aid (EAA) Soils Scheme.
Soil analysis reports provide valuable information on the nutrient content of your soils and are a useful tool for planning nutrient applications.
Planning nutrient management
The workshops aim to help farmers who participated in the scheme to understand what their soil analysis means.
Planning lime, manure and fertiliser applications to produce high-yielding grass and forage crops, whilst also: improving and maintaining soil fertility; saving money on chemical fertilisers; and reducing the risk of nutrient loss, thus improving water quality, are important.
- Training for participants in the ‘Catchment Scheme’ – within 11 sub catchments of the Upper Bann – will continue until the end of March.
- Training for participants in the ‘Open Scheme’ – across the rest of Northern Ireland – finished at the end of February, but five extra workshops have been organised across NI and will run until the end of March.
The workshops have been arranged jointly between the College of Agriculture, Food and Rural Enterprise (CAFRE) and AI Services under the Farm Family Key Skills (FFKS) initiative, which is partly funded by the EU under the NIRDP 2014-2020.
Alternative dates are available but must be pre-booked. For further information contact AI Services on: 028-9083-3123.
