Tony McLoughlin (Sligo-North Leitrim, Fine Gael)
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439. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the amount the Irish Cattle Breeding Federation will be charging farmers on the new beef data genomics programme to be compliant with the genotyping requirements of the programme; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [20698/15]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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The Government has made a provision of €52 million for the BDGP in 2015. It forms part of the country’s draft Rural Development Programme and will have a budget of approximately €300 million over a period of 6 years. The BDGP will accelerate improvement in the crucial area of environmental sustainability in the national herd through the application of genomic technology and will bring about long-term strategic improvements to the sector by fundamentally improving the genetic quality of the beef herd. It will also position Ireland as a global leader in the application of genomics technology and confirm our reputation as one of the most important export focused beef producing nations in the world.

Participants in the programme will receive a payment of €142.50 per hectare for the first 6.66 payable hectares under the scheme, and €120 per payable hectare after that. Payment to scheme participants is on the basis of costs incurred and income foregone for each of the actions undertaken. All of the costs to the farmer, including a very substantial overhead for time and effort, have been factored into the payment for the farmer as agreed with the European Commission. The payment includes a cost associated with the tissue tag sample and subsequent processing, and this will be deducted at source from the farmer’s payment.

The cost of the genotyping will be finalised following the conclusion of a public tendering process undertaken by the ICBF in relation to laboratory analysis, tissue tags and the DNA chip and is not expected to exceed that of the 2014 scheme as a proportion of overall payment.