Northern Ireland’s Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs Minister, Andrew Muir, has announced the launch of the Farming for the Generations pilot scheme, which aims to raise awareness of succession planning within farm families.
The scheme will support farm families through a three phased approach: planning for succession, developing the successor, and supporting the lead generation within the farm family.
It will also link farmers without a family successor to new entrants and other farm businesses, providing them access to land and other resources.
“The Farming for the Generations pilot scheme is part of my department’s transformational new Farm Support and Development Programme, and aims to raise awareness of the need for succession planning on farms to help ensure the long-term sustainability of the farm business.
“If a succession plan isn’t in place, this can introduce a high degree of uncertainty for the business.
“The new Planning for Succession element of the pilot will target 60 farm families and will include support for the farm business to develop a succession plan, a farm business review and a Personal Development Plan for the successor,” Minister Muir said.
Rural Support have been assigned the responsibility of delivering the pilot scheme on behalf of The Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs of Northern Ireland (DAERA).
It already provides a range of programmes and services for farm communities to support livelihoods and wellbeing within the sector.
These services include:
- On-farm Business Support;
- Farm Business Programmes;
- Person Centred Support;
- Bereavement and Loss Support;
- Support for Older Farmers;
- Social Farming Support Service;
- Agri Sector Training.
Commenting on the launch of the Farming for the Generations pilot scheme, CEO of Rural Support, Kevin Doherty said: “Rural Support, the Farm Support Charity for Northern Ireland is delighted to have won this contract.
“A key focus of this programme is succession planning, as establishing a plan for the farm succession will ensure effective transfer of responsibilities and assets to the next generation; whilst ensuring the protection of both the farm business and farm family.
“Registration for a number of awareness sessions will open soon via social media and our website and these sessions will inform our farming community of what this programme includes, how it will affect their farm business and how they can get involved.”
Minister Muir is keen to address key issues within the farming community, one such being the ageing demographic.
According to 2018 DAERA equality indicators statistics, the mean age of farmers in NI is 59, with 36% of these farmers aged over 65 and only 8% under the age of 40.
Muir encourages all farm businesses to consider availing of the pilot scheme, which will commence with a range of awareness sessions across NI in the coming months.
