Robert Troy (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail)
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33. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine if he will justify the removal of the most popular measures under green low-carbon agri-environment scheme, low input permanent pasture, which has been criticised by the Irish Cattle and Sheep Farmers' Association for unfairly penalising low-income cattle and sheep farmers. [35905/15]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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On the basis of the plans submitted for the 27,000 applications received to date under Tranche 1 of GLAS, it is clear that we have already met or exceeded our targets for the entire RDP period for the Low Input Permanent Pasture action.

For this reason, it is proposed to adjust the provision for the Low Input Permanent Pasture (LIPP) action under the second tranche of GLAS, given that we have already met all our targets. As things stand, over 20% of the entire budget for GLAS will be directed towards payments of this one action. However, it will still be possible to take a combination of up to 10 hectares of LIPP or Traditional Hay Meadow as before, but for Tranche 2 the LIPP component will be limited to 5 hectares. Instead, I would like to see more farmers avail of the Traditional Hay Meadow option, which attracts the same rate of payment.