Charlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail)
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431. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine [11238/18]

Michael Creed (Cork North West, Fine Gael)
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The Organic Farming sector has seen unprecedented growth in the last few years, driven very largely by the new Organic Farming Scheme designed and introduced under Ireland’s RDP 2014-2020.  

The targets committed under the Organic Farming Scheme for the RDP 2014-2020 were to attract some 16,000 hectares of new land into production and to support 46,000 hectares of converted land.  The Organic Farming Scheme has achieved and exceeded these targets for the RDP period. 

Evidence of this is that 26,000 hectares were converted to organic farming during this period.  As a consequence there are currently approximately 72,000 hectares of land  under organic production.