Willie Penrose (Longford-Westmeath, Labour)
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Question 471: To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will take steps to expedite an application by a person (details supplied) for an appropriate licence. [28613/09]

Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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The person concerned has applied to my Department for approval to treat animal by-products in a composting plant in accordance with Regulation (EC) No 1774 of 2002. This Regulation lays down strict controls for the safe use and disposal of animal by-products, with a view to safeguarding human and animal health.

As part of the approval process, the plant operator must be able to demonstrate that the technology used is capable of achieving prescribed processing parameter requirements consistently and reliably. To that end a satisfactory validation proposal must be submitted to my Department, before validation of the plant can commence. Unfortunately validation proposals submitted to date have not been satisfactory and the person concerned has been advised that it will be necessary to cease accepting animal by-products from 15th July 2009, unless a satisfactory validation proposal is received and agreed in the meantime. Any relevant information received from the applicant will be dealt with as a matter of priority.