Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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145. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine when it is proposed that GLAS will commence; the opening date for applications; when the scheme will be in operation; when it is proposed to have these payments commence; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [26360/14]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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GLAS (the Green Low-carbon Agri-environment Scheme) is part of a suite of proposed measures under the new Rural Development Programme (RDP). I will be submitting the draft RDP to the European Commission within the next few weeks and I would hope to secure formal approval in time to roll-out the new GLAS Scheme for applications before the end of this year.

The regulations allow for up to 75% of the total payment due to the participant to be made once all administrative checks have been carried out and that being the case, I would expect the first payments to commence in the last quarter of 2015.

The proposed maximum payment is €5,000 per annum, with the Scheme building up to the inclusion of some 50,000 farmers with a total envisaged expenditure of €1,450m over the programming period. I expect most farmers to achieve the maximum payment under the Scheme.