Joe Walsh
Question:298 Mr. J. Walsh asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and Forestry the number of farmers who leased their land and milk quota in the 1996/1997 year; and the volume of milk involved. [9123/97]
Written Answers - Milk Quota Leases.
Joe Walsh
Question:299 Mr. J. Walsh asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and Forestry the number of farmers and the volume of milk involved in the temporary leasing scheme for the 1996/1997 milk quota year. [9124/97]
Joe Walsh
Question:305 Mr. J. Walsh asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and Forestry the number of gallons of milk put into temporary leasing in 1996 as a result of the changes he made in the leasing regime; the estimate in this regard for 1997; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [9180/97]
I propose to take Questions Nos. 298, 299 and 305 together.
Details of land-milk quota leases have been requested from the co-operatives-dairies as part of the annual report for 1996-97. It is expected that these reports will shortly be submitted to my Department, thus enabling national statistics to be compiled. It is estimated that 28,000 producers applied for additional quota under the 1996-97 temporary leasing scheme and that the volume of quota available amounted to 60 million gallons approximately.
While it is not possible at this stage to quantify the beneficial effect, on the temporary leasing scheme, of the introduction of a 10 per cent claw-back on land leases, it is generally accepted that this contributed positively to the amount of quota offered under the third stage of the scheme. It is not possible either to estimate the amount of quota which will be available in the 1997-98 temporary leasing scheme because of the many factors outside of the scheme itself which can have an influence.