Results 11,561-11,580 of 23,956 for speaker:Charlie McConalogue

Written Answers — Department of Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht: Covid-19 Pandemic Supports (28 Apr 2021)

Charlie McConalogue: An additional €79 million, including €23 million from the carbon tax fund, was provided in Budget 2021 to support actions by my Department in the area of biodiversity, climate, environment and farm health and safety, all the while supporting farm incomes. This is already being implemented across a range of agri-environment measures through the REAP...

Written Answers — Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Afforestation Programme (28 Apr 2021)

Charlie McConalogue: The Department is committed to addressing the backlog in licences. Project Woodland has been established and working groups are actively examining the backlog with the aim of improving the rate of licensing in accordance with environmental compliance. The afforestation scheme is a demand-led scheme and its participation is voluntary. The Government's target is to aim to achieve an...

Written Answers — Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Forestry Grants (28 Apr 2021)

Charlie McConalogue: The Department offers a generous suite of establishment grants and annual premiums under the Afforestation Grant and Premium Scheme, with grant and premium categories and species to suit most land types. At present, there is 4,300 ha of land approved to plant forestry where planting has not yet commenced. I encourage anyone that has an approved afforestation site, to arrange...

Written Answers — Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Forestry Sector (28 Apr 2021)

Charlie McConalogue: All Forestry Inspectors in the Department are authorised officers under the Forestry Act 2014. The powers of authorised officers are laid down in Section 24 of the Forestry Act 2014. These powers include examining any lands to which the authorised officers have reasonable grounds for believing that the relevant statutory provisions apply.

Written Answers — Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Forestry Sector (28 Apr 2021)

Charlie McConalogue: District Inspectors may recommend suspension of a licence having regard to all the circumstances of the case, including non-compliance with any conditions. The decision to suspend a licence is made at administrative level. Any such decision may be appealed to the Forestry Appeals Committee.

Written Answers — Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Forestry Data (28 Apr 2021)

Charlie McConalogue: The COFORD Council does not have a budget or make payments to beneficiaries. However, on a case-by-case basis, the Department does provide funding to facilitate the work of individual COFORD working groups during each council term where specific needs are identified as being necessary for their work. Individual members of the COFORD Council, except those who are there...

Written Answers — Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Forestry Sector (28 Apr 2021)

Charlie McConalogue: I understand the FAC has never cancelled, set-aside or remitted a licence on the grounds that a Forestry Inspector rather than an ecologist carried out the screening. To assist in screening for appropriate assessment, Forestry Inspectors use a Standard Operational Procedures document and other documents produced with ecologist input.

Written Answers — Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Departmental Staff (28 Apr 2021)

Charlie McConalogue: The two Senior Inspectors are Fergus Moore, Senior Inspector, Head of Forest Sector Development Division and Seamus Dunne, Senior Inspector, Head of Forestry Inspectorate Division. Within Forestry in the Department, there are nine permanent ecologists. The Head of Ecology is at Forestry Inspector Grade 1 level, one ecologist is at Ecologist Grade 3 level and seven are at...

Written Answers — Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Departmental Staff (28 Apr 2021)

Charlie McConalogue: There are currently 27 Forestry Inspectors Grade 3 who, amongst their duties, carry out work on licensing of files. This includes work associated with the licencing of forest road applications, afforestation applications and felling applications.

Written Answers — Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Departmental Expenditure (28 Apr 2021)

Charlie McConalogue: The Department has forestry personnel deployed to buildings all over the country, often shared with other Department personnel or indeed personnel from other Departments.  Therefore, it is not possible to provide information on costs for the items requested for forestry personnel, separate to those for the entire Department. The travel and subsistence costs for 2018 to 2020 for the...

Written Answers — Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Forestry Sector (28 Apr 2021)

Charlie McConalogue: I understand that the submission referred to from NPWS in 2012 was made to a sub-group of the COFORD Council called the COFORD Council Land Available Working Group.  The purpose of the submission was to highlight to participants in the group the obligations under EU and national law when considering afforestation. The paper usefully documented requirements in 2012. There...

Written Answers — Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Departmental Staff (28 Apr 2021)

Charlie McConalogue: Project Woodland, under the leadership of Minister of State Hackett who has responsibility for forestry, is an initiative to tackle issues in forestry in Ireland and to promote and encourage woodland creation. It involves four different Working Groups reporting to Minister of State Hackett through a Project Manager and a Project Board. The Project Board is being...

Written Answers — Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Agriculture Schemes (28 Apr 2021)

Charlie McConalogue: My Department is very conscious of ensuring access to services for farmers that have a disability, and aims to ensure that the needs of all its customers, including people with disabilities are met and that the rights of equal treatment are upheld in the delivery of services. In this regard, there are two Access Officers appointed who are responsible for providing or arranging for...

Written Answers — Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Forestry Sector (28 Apr 2021)

Charlie McConalogue: I propose to take Questions Nos. 1119, 1120, 1121, 1122 and 1131 together. The Department makes available a selection of forestry statistics on the Department’s pages of the Government of Ireland website, gov.ie.  A Forestry Dashboard is circulated weekly and provides details of outputs for that week, month, and year to date.  Data on afforestation, forest...

Written Answers — Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Covid-19 Pandemic (28 Apr 2021)

Charlie McConalogue: Since the outbreak of COVID-19, the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine has worked closely with representatives of the marts to ensure that their operations could continue. I commend mart staff, management and their farmer customers for the resilience and co-operation that they have shown and the speed with which they have...

Written Answers — Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Departmental Funding (28 Apr 2021)

Charlie McConalogue: A total of €1.826 billion was allocated to my Department in Budget 2021.  The following table summarises the breakdown of the allocation across the Department’s voted expenditure programmes. Programme Expenditure Current Capital Total €000 €000 €000 A. Food...

Written Answers — Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Agriculture Scheme Eligibility (28 Apr 2021)

Charlie McConalogue: I propose to take Questions Nos. 1125 and 1130 together. The Results Based Environment Agri Pilot Project (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. Similar to the European...

Written Answers — Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Agriculture Schemes (28 Apr 2021)

Charlie McConalogue: I secured an additional €79 million, including €23 million carbon tax, in Budget 2021 to support action in the area of biodiversity, climate, environment and health and safety, all the while supporting farm incomes. My intention is to allocate the funding as follows: - Re-opening of the organic farming scheme €5m, - Straw Incorporation measure (SIM)...

Written Answers — Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Agriculture Schemes (28 Apr 2021)

Charlie McConalogue: The Results Based Environment Agri Pilot Project (REAP) is designed to test the results based concept in the broadest possible range of farming conditions. Ranking and selection of applicants will only take place if the project is oversubscribed. In this event, two separate groups will be identified based on their stocking levels, one with less than 140kg N/ha stocking rate and one...

Written Answers — Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine: Agriculture Schemes (28 Apr 2021)

Charlie McConalogue: I propose to take Questions Nos. 1128 and 1129 together. The Programme for Government commits to rewarding farmers for adapting to more sustainable methods of farming and to the development of a new agri-environment scheme capable of delivering broad environmental and biodiversity benefits that will align financial supports with climate objectives. To advance this aim, the Results-Based...