Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 14 May 2015
27. Deputy Charlie McConalogue asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the total number of applications which have been made under the new green low-carbon agri-environment scheme; the number and percentage of farms which have commonage lands which have submitted an application under this scheme; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [18675/15]
View answerFollowing successful negotiations with the European Commission, I opened the GLAS online application system on 23 February, 2015 for the preparation of applications, with the intention of activating the submit-facility once formal approval of the Rural Development Programme as a whole was notified. This has now been received, in the form of a ‘letter of comfort’ from the EU Commission. The ‘submit’ facility was activated last week and applications can now be formally submitted.
The total figure for applications created on the GLAS on-line system now stands at over 28,000. Of those, more than 20,000 have selected actions. This represents a very positive response to GLAS and is a remarkable achievement by all involved. The total number of applications actually signed-off and submitted since the submit-facility went live last week is 2,000. It is likely that most applications will be formally submitted nearer to the closing date of 22 May, 2015.
As regards commonages approximately 4,300 applications have commonage land, which represents about 32% of commonage shareholders eligible to join GLAS, and of those 3,380 have already selected actions. This is represents a solid response by commonage farmers to a measure which will deliver significant benefits for Ireland’s uplands. It should be recognised, of course, that many commonage farmers are already in an existing agri-environment scheme, AEOS, and will opt to see out those contracts before embarking on a new one under GLAS. That is something we have specifically provided for in the design of the GLAS measure. However, I anticipate that the take-up by commonage farmers will continue to increase before the closing date of this first tranche of GLAS, and that in future tranches more commonage farmers will take the opportunity to join existing Commonage Management Plans.
