Vol. 542 No. 5
242 Mr. Durkan asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and Rural Development the total acreage under cereals; the extent to which this represents a positive or negative trend on recent years; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [25292/01]
My Department's estimate of the area under cereals for the 2001 harvest is 282,000 hectares. This is the same area as in the previous year and is an increase of 2,000 hectares on 1999. A feature of the 2001 harvest was a considerable drop in winter wheat sowings up to the end of December, due to particularly wet weather during the latter part of 2000. This resulted in some 25% of winter wheat being sown early in the new year.
