Tógfaidh mé Ceisteanna Uimh. 121 go 125 le chéile.
The Minister of State at my Department, Deputy Carey, has had meetings with farmers and their representatives in the Burren area of County Clare to discuss the proposed designation of special areas of conservation and related matters in the context of the rural environmental protection scheme. SACs will generally be selected from the areas already proposed for eventual natural heritage area status and will account for about 550,000 hectares in about 400 sites, or about 70 per cent of the proposed NHA areas. The specific areas to be proposed for inclusion in SACs will be published as soon as I make the regulations to transpose the EU habitats directive into Irish law. This will happen very shortly.
When the regulations are in place, the process of consultation with individual landowners and the general public leading to SAC designation will commence. Details of the designation proposals will be sent to each landowner-user thought to be affected where these can be identified. These details will include maps as well as information regarding the conditions applicable to the relevant site, compensation and arrangements for objections-appeals.
In addition, the designation proposals will be publicly advertised and persons who feel that they may be affected but who have not received individual notifications will be invited to contact the National Parks and Wildlife Service of my Department, which will provide the relevant information.
The conservation conditions which will apply to SACS in the Burren will be identical to those already agreed by my Department, the Department of Agriculture, Food and Forestry, Teagasc, private planners, and farming organisations in the context of the REP scheme, which is administered by the Department of Agriculture, Food and Forestry.