Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 22 June 2021

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine

Organic Farming: Discussion (Resumed)

Photo of Michael CollinsMichael Collins (Cork South West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I will keep my questions brief. I have been talking about organic farming last week and this week and the difficulties that I know many organic farmers experience. They are finding it difficult to survive. It sounds like the Minister has many ambitious plans. I sincerely hope that these will be followed through because they are needed on the ground. People with a farm of up to 70 acres are paying up to €600 for registration and maybe €500 for a planner, while getting a grant of €2,000. Such a farmer cannot sell his or her cattle in rural areas because there is no market for them. Unfortunately, there is a vacuum and the marts should be encouraged to have a market for organic cattle.

The organic farming scheme in 2018 had 225 applications. Some 110 farmers never got in and 63 stayed with organic farming. Have they received the conversion payments? Will they get the payment with the new scheme? Why was the new organic farming scheme not full?

I hear much about new eco-schemes. Why can we not develop the one great scheme that we have, which is the organic scheme? We talk about bringing in another and another. At the end of the day, the organic scheme has to be the most eco-friendly scheme. We should develop that scheme. Why are we not doing that?

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