Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail)
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476. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the reason that there is a minimum stocking level of 0.5 LU per hectare laid down in the organic farming scheme; his plans to give a derogation from this requirement to farmers farming mountain type land as defined for the purposes of the disadvantaged areas scheme and proposed ANC scheme or where stocking prescriptions of less than 0.5 LU are laid down by the National Parks and Wildlife Service in Natura 2000 sites; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [34480/14]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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Ireland is self-sufficient in the production of organic red meat for the home market but there is clear potential to develop the export market further. For example, in the conventional sector 90% of the beef produced is exported and in the organic sector there is clearly scope to export a multiple of what we consume at home. The challenge is to increase the scale and regularity of supply from producers here at home. It is for this reason that my Department has included a minimum stocking level of 0.5 LU per hectare in the Organic Farming Scheme to encourage producers to respond to the market demand for organically produced food. This is not a new requirement – the exact same provision formed part of the Organic Farming Scheme under the previous Rural development Programme.

However, the over-riding objective of the Organic Farming Scheme is to promote systems of farming which are in harmony with the environment. Where it is clear that a stocking density of 0.5LU per hectare is not in the best environmental interest, my Department is prepared to look at these instances on a case-by-case basis.