Holly Cairns
Question:20. Deputy Holly Cairns asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the reason farmers in the organic farming scheme were excluded from the Rural Environmental-Agri Pilot Programme. [26917/21]
View answerThursday, 20 May 2021
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The Results Based Environment Agri Pilot (REAP) is an ambitious environmental project designed to test the results based approach on a variety of farm types. The project will feed into the development of the next national agri-environment scheme to follow on from GLAS. REAP is designed to focus on key learning objectives for participants and their advisors.
The REAP scorecard based system has been developed to assess the sustainability of agricultural grasslands. It is a targeted measure for farmers not currently participating in other agri-environment schemes and is an opportunity to broaden the base of participation in agri-environment projects.
The REAP project is a short-term transitional measure which uses additional funding I secured in the budget for farmers for this year. This necessitated a quick turnaround and I am happy to confirm that the project is on track despite the extremely tight timeframe.
Driving the organic farming sector is also a key priority for the Department and we have set an ambitious target in the Programme for Government to bring the participation rate up to the EU average during the lifetime of this Government. The main support available to organic farmers through the Department's Organic Farming Scheme which we rolled over to this year by providing an extra year's contract to all participants.
We also reopened it this year to new entrants and I'm very pleased that a further 317 applications were received to join the latest tranche of the scheme which will increase the number of organic farmers in Ireland by 20%.
In terms of participation in both schemes though, double funding under schemes is prohibited under EU regulations which was a consideration in only opening REAP to farmers who are not in any of the schemes or projects such as GLAS and Organics.
I am very pleased with the level of interest shown in REAP by both farmers and their advisors. This level of interest is particularly welcome at a time when work on designing new agri environment measures under the CAP Strategic Plan is progressing.