Mr. Paud Evans:

I spent my early years on a farm on which some fields were covered by rocks from an adjacent pebble beach, so I am familiar with the problems raised.

The Department operates robust derogation provisions for farmers in the agri-environment options scheme who do not meet the minimum stocking density. Each year, many affected farmers get paid when this occurs. In the cases of the seven-month rule and flooded lands, the Department will take a sympathetic approach when assessing them at payment time in September 2014.

We have to look at land that is lost and land that is temporarily lost as separate matters. The decisions recently made by the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine on the implementation of the basic payment scheme will assist farmers affected. In the first instance, the number of entitlements a farmer will hold under the basic payment scheme in 2015 onwards is the number of eligible hectares he or she declared in 2013 and 2015 if lower. That means that land that is lost permanently will not be declared in 2105 and, therefore, that farmer will fully protected under the new regime. There is also a second element of protection. This week, the Minister announced he will use the value of the payment entitlements owned on 15 May 2014 to calculate the value of the basic payment from 2015 onwards. This means that if a farmer did not have enough land in 2014 to obtain the full payment, they will still get the benefit of the full value of their entitlements in the new calculation for 2015.

I note in the media that farmers with surplus entitlements are being encouraged to dispose of them. My advice would be to think very carefully about this because the value of those will be built into their new payment for at least seven years.

As for the protections for 2014, we have to look at land that is lost and land that is temporarily lost as separate matters. For land that has been damaged by the recent storms and will not be properly back in agricultural use by 15 May 2014, the principle of force majeure will have to apply and farmers will get payment. As Dr. Smyth said, the Department will take a pragmatic approach to these cases. The second element is land that is permanently lost which has happened in several counties. There will be no issue from 2015 onwards and the farmers will be fully protected. However, for 2014, the Minister has asked us to examine this problem to see if there are solutions to these cases.

We have great sympathy for these people who have lost some of their land. We are examining the possibility, as the Deputy mentioned, that these people could consolidate on their reduced hectares in 2014, which would mean they could be fully paid in 2014 as well as being protected going forward. That covers most of the queries on the disadvantaged areas and the single farm payment.