Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)

I thank Deputy Finneran for raising this important issue and making such a positive contribution. I am pleased to have this opportunity to clarify the current position regarding the updating of the Department's standard costings for the purposes of grant payments under the new farm waste management scheme. Deputy Finneran has been in constant contact with the Minister, Deputy Coughlan, and myself on this important matter.

The new scheme was launched by the Department last March to assist farmers to meet the additional requirements of the nitrates directive. The amendments to the scheme included, in particular, an increase in the standard grant rate from the previous 40% to 60%, with 70% being available in the four zone C counties, namely, Cavan, Donegal, Leitrim and Monaghan. I am particularly pleased that the new scheme recognises the special issues arising for farmers in the zone C region as far as compliance with the new nitrates directive provisions is concerned. The new scheme also provides for an increase in the maximum eligible investment ceiling from €75,000 to €120,000 and removes any minimum income requirements from farming from the scheme, so that all small farmers can participate. This latter change was particularly welcomed by me.

As the current European Union rural development round closes at the end of this year, applications under the scheme must be received by the end of 2006. For this reason, the Department of Agriculture and Food has also agreed to accept applications under the new scheme as soon as application has been made to the relevant local authority for any required planning permission. This administrative change will ensure that all farmers wishing to avail of the revised scheme will be in a position to submit applications by the end of year deadline.

The financial commitment of this Government to the scheme is substantial. A sum of €43 million has been made available for the scheme in this year's Estimates and up to €250 million has been ear-marked for the scheme over its projected three year period of operation as farmers generally have until the end of December 2008 to comply with this particular element of the new nitrates regulations.

There has been huge interest by Irish farmers in the new scheme since its launch. Over 4,600 applications were received from farmers during the second quarter of 2006, that is, a three month period, compared with just over 3,000 under the preceding version of the scheme during the full calendar year of 2005. These figures, as Deputy Finneran mentioned, confirm that farmers have found the new scheme particularly attractive and that the scheme will have a vital role in ensuring that the required infrastructure is in place on Irish farms to ensure compliance with the nitrates directive by the relevant European Union deadlines.

As far as the standard costings are concerned, my Government colleague, the Minister for Agriculture and Food, Deputy Coughlan, indicated, when launching the revised scheme last March, that the costings used to determine the level of grant payments under the scheme were under review at that time. The revised costings will therefore be introduced by the Department as soon as this review is completed. The Minister, Deputy Coughlan, has already given a commitment that the revised costings, when introduced, will be applied to all approvals issued under the scheme since 1 January 2006. Accordingly, farmers can be assured that developments in relation to the cost of materials or labour used in the construction of farm buildings will be taken into account when the grants come to be paid to them under the revised scheme. For reasons of confidentiality, the individual costings have never been made available by the Department to farmers or their advisers.

I assure Deputy Finneran that I am confident that the Minister will be in a position to announce the introduction of the revised costings in the very near future. I thank Deputy Finneran for giving me the opportunity to clarify the current position on what is a matter of great importance to farming.

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