Declaring the Afforestation Grant in Tax Return

ODonohue42

Hi all, Last year, I planted a few acres of woodland with the assistance of the afforestation grant. Everything went well, it passed the inspection and the initial grant was paid out.

I understand that the afforestation grant is not liable for income tax, but that it is liable for PRSI and the USC. On the forestryservices.ie site:
"Pay Related Social Insurance (PRSI): Income from commercial woodlands including the forest premium is reckoned for the purpose of PRSI". The SWSForestry website also confirms that the forestry grant is liable for USC.

Hence, I believe I need to declare this in a yearly tax return. So far, so good. My question is what figure should be declared. The grant came to about €3000. Of that, €2500 went on fencing (I have the receipt for this) and the purchase of the trees came to €400. Hence, the grant was €3000, but the "profit" was €100. I inquired with Revenue, and they state that the €3000 should be declared. This seems unusual though - when you make gains on anything else (say, shares, property, etc.), you deduct any costs from the figure before declaring it.

Could anyone confirm which figure should be declared?

Thanks.

fergus1001

Would the grant not have covered sws or who ever planted the site to fence it ?

You can right off your expenses against tax

ODonohue42

We planted the trees and applied for the grant ourselves rather than having a company like SWF handle everything for us, so the grant came directly to us. We did pay a fencing contractor to do the fencing however.

I certainly would have expected to be able to write off the expenses, such as the fencing, against the amount of the grant to be declared to Revenue, but that's not what they are saying - they state that the full grant amount should be declared. That's essentially why I posted - I was hoping to see if other people who have planted forestry declared the full grant amount or just the amount left over after expenses.