Michael McCarthy (Cork South West, Labour)
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87. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine if he will give due consideration to a proposal to commence contracts for the new agri-environmental GLAS scheme in early 2015, with 30,000 farmers allowed into the scheme in its first year and payments disbursed in 2015; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [36122/14]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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The new GLAS Scheme is currently with the European Commission for approval, as part of the Rural Development Programme 2014 – 2020. Once such approval is granted, my Department will move to open the Scheme for applications. I would hope to be able to do so before the end of the year, but this is entirely dependent on approval being secured in time from the EU. However, I am confident that the scheme will be open to applications in 2015 and I am making provision for up to 30,000 applicants in the first year. Payments for 2015 will be in respect of a part-year only, as is normal with the commencement of a new scheme like this, but contracts will then run for their full five year term from 2016. This means that entrants into GLAS next year will benefit from an additional part-payment in respect of 2015, on top of the usual five year contract.