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Ewes payment scheme
23/11/2007
The European Commission has given go-ahead for emergency payments to sheep farmers to compensate for losses arising as a result of the recent outbreaks of foot and mouth disease.
Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs and the Environment, Richard Lochhead, said:
"Our farmers and crofters have been very badly hit by a crisis not of their making, the outbreaks of foot and mouth in the south of England.
"We are pleased that the European Commission, once it had received the additional information requested from us, acted very quickly in agreeing to publish the scheme. We pressed hard for this and managed to persuade them of our case. This should allow us to make payments within the next week or so.
"I am delighted that this scheme can now go ahead as soon as the Commission publishes it on their website."
The scheme was announced in Parliament on October 24 as part of a wider package of emergency measures to help the Scottish livestock industry recover from the severe crisis resulting from the foot and mouth outbreak in England.
It offers farmers and crofters payments of 6 pounds sterling per breeding ewe. The total cost is estimated at £19 million.
The payments cannot legally be made before the Commission publishes the scheme. The Commission requested additional information about the scheme; now that this has been provided, Commission officials have agreed to publish it, as soon as details have been translated into all official languages.