Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 25 November 2015
37. Deputy Martin Ferris asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine if he will address the injustice around the anomaly which results in young-old farmers being denied payments which are available to young farmers after 2009. [41250/15]
View answerIn accordance with the EU Regulations governing the National Reserve and the Young Farmers Scheme, a young farmer is defined as a farmer aged no more than 40 years of age in the year when s/he first submits an application under the Basic Payment Scheme and who commenced their farming activity no more than five years prior to submitting that application. The regulation also provides that priority under the National Reserve is given to ‘young farmers’ and to ‘new entrants to farming’. A new entrant is defined as a farmer who commenced their agricultural activity during the previous two years. The Regulations governing the operation of the National Reserve also include an optional provision whereby Member States may use the National Reserve to allocate new entitlements or give a top-up on the value of existing entitlements for persons who suffer from a ‘Specific Disadvantage’. Following my Department’s consultation with the EU Commission, I announced in March 2015 that the group commonly known as “Old Young Farmers”, who established their holding between 1 January 2008 and 31 December 2009, and who, due to the timeframe of setting up their holding did not benefit from either the Installation Aid or the Young Farmer category of the National Reserve, can be considered as a ‘group suffering from specific disadvantage’. The result is that this group was eligible to apply under the National Reserve measure of the 2015 Basic Payment Scheme.
Eligibility for the Young Farmers Scheme is clearly defined in the EU Regulation and is restricted to farmers who commenced their farming activity no more than five years prior to submitting the Basic Payment Scheme application. My Department has no discretion in the implementation of this aspect of the Regulation and in this regard farmers who commenced their agricultural activity prior to 1 January 2010 are not eligible for the Young Farmers Scheme.
Under the TAMS Schemes the definition of the Young Farmer is set out in the EU Regulations and the criteria for increasing the grant aid payable to 60% is to the cadre of farmers who have met the requirements of set-up for the first time within five years of the receipt of an application under the Young Farmer Scheme. I do not have scope to extend this criterion. However, I am aware that there are a number of farmers who have missed out on previous grant schemes and I intend to prioritise their applications under all of the other TAMS schemes where the grant rate is payable at 40%.
