Charlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail)
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322. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the number of farmers who have received payments under the green low-carbon agri-environment scheme; the average payment made to these farmers; the percentage payment made to them; if GLAS+ payments have been made yet; if not, when they will be paid; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [12120/16]

Michael Creed (Cork North West, Fine Gael)
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For GLAS Tranche 1 applications with a start-date of 1 October 2015 and which have GLAS actions which are payable in 2015 are eligible for a 2015 part-year payment (covering the three month period 1 October -31 December 2015). Some 20,400 applicants have received the first instalment, representing up to 85%, of their 2015 part year payment , at an average payment of €640 per applicant. All remaining cases meeting all of the payment validation checks will be paid the full amount of their 2015 part-year payment at the same time that the 2015 GLAS balancing payment is due to issue, currently scheduled for June 2016.

The full details of the number of GLAS Tranche 1 applications which qualify for GLAS+ payments will only be available when full year GLAS payment calculations are finalised. GLAS + payments in respect of the 2015 part-year payments will issue shortly after the 2015 balancing payment process.

It is important to note that these part-year payments are purely in respect of actions that are payable in 2015. Therefore 2015 part year payments do not reflect the full range of actions undertaken by GLAS applicants and cannot be used as a basis to extrapolate the average value of a GLAS contract over a full year. Farmers will only see the full value of their contracts when payments are calculated for 2016, the first full year of their five-year contracts.