Written answers

Tuesday, 31 March 2015

Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine

Rural Development Programme

Photo of Éamon Ó CuívÉamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail)
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181. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine when it is hoped the rural development programme for Ireland will be agreed; if he has yet received the letters of comfort he has referred to on several occasions from the Commission; the legal standing of such letters; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [12717/15]

Photo of Simon CoveneySimon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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The new Rural Development Programme (RDP) 2014-2020 will be a key support in enhancing the competitiveness of the agri-food sector, achieving a more sustainable management of natural resources and ensuring a more balanced development of rural areas. The draft RDP was formally submitted to the European Commission on 3 July 2014, and the Commission’s formal response was received on 20 October 2014. Detailed and intensive negotiations have since been ongoing between my Department and the Commission in order to secure agreement on the new RDP. Ireland’s RDP has now been formally resubmitted to the EU Commission, where it has entered the Commission’s final round of inter-services consultation.

The formal approval of RDPs in 2015 cannot be finalised until the Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) has been amended by the EU. However, in order to ensure that this does not delay the roll out of RDPs as they are agreed with the Commission, Commissioner Hogan recently announced that letters of comfort will issue to Member States as they agree their RDPs bilaterally with the Commission.

The purpose of the letter of comfort is to facilitate Member States in rolling out the implementation of their RDPs once they have completed the negotiations and final inter-service consultation stages with the Commission. At that point, only the formal legal adoption of the RDPs would remain to be completed. This final step will take place after the amendment of the Multiannual Financial Framework.

A letter of comfort has not yet been received from the Commission in relation to our RDP. The letter cannot issue until the final round of the Commission’s inter-services consultation has been completed. Officials in my Department are continuing to work closely with the EU Commission to ensure that the final stages of the process can now be expedited.

When the Commission’s final round of inter-services consultation is complete and the letter of comfort has issued, the schemes and supports contained in Ireland’s RDP will be rolled out in line with the annual budgetary process.

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