Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 29 November 2016
641. Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the number of commonages to which planners have been assigned; the number to which there is currently no planner assigned; the number of participants in GLAS on the commonages assigned to planners and the number on commonages with no planner assigned to them; the total number of active farmers on these commonages; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [36897/16]
View answerCommonage Advisors have been assigned to prepare Commonage Management Plans (CMPs) for over 2,700 commonages which have been brought into the first two tranches of GLAS. A further 77 commonages are currently being reassessed where the commonage advisor initially assigned is no longer in a position to complete the work and 35 commonages have had no advisor assigned as there were no expressions of interest received.
Some 6,600 farmers have declared 13,000 commonages shares as part of their GLAS applications of which approximately 300 have declared shares on the 112 commonages for which the assignment of a commonage advisor is yet to be finalised.
My Department is currently finalising arrangements to assign an advisor to these 112 commonages and to put in place a procedure to ensure that GLAS participants on these commonages will have their 2016 GLAS payment processed at the same time as all other GLAS 1 and 2 participants.
