Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail)
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584. To ask the Minister for Rural and Community Development the number of applications made under the rural regeneration and development fund to date by county; the number of applications granted funding to date by county; the funding approved for the scheme in 2019; the number and value of payments made to date in 2019 for approved projects; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [43540/19]

Michael Ring (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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The Rural Regeneration and Development Fund seeks to support ambitious and strategic projects which have the potential to transform rural economies and communities. The Government has committed €1 billion over 10 years to the Fund and €315 million is allocated to the Fund for the period 2019-2022. 

The first call under the Fund closed in September 2018.  280 applications were received – 126 Category 1 applications (projects which had the relevant planning and consents in place and could commence capital works in 2019) and 154 Category 2 applications (projects which had potential but needed further development to enable them to be potentially submitted as Category 1 proposals in the future). The number of applications per county is set out in Table 1.

In November 2018 and February 2019 I announced details of a total of 38 Category 1 projects and 46 Category 2 projects which were successful under the first call from the Fund, providing €86m in support for projects worth a total of €117m.  The county breakdown of the projects which were announced is set out in Table 2.

Following the announcement of the successful projects, my Department engaged with each lead party to complete due diligence requirements.  Contractual arrangements were also drawn up with the release of funding based on the achievement of key milestones in the projects. 

In this regard, significant progress is already being made on the implementation of successful projects.  A number of the projects have already reached their first milestone and had funding released.  To date, €13,966,102 has been drawn down from the Fund by 25 separate projects.  I expect that payments from the Fund will continue to accelerate over the coming weeks and months as further milestones are achieved across the other projects.

The second call for Category 1 applications under the Fund closed on the 6^thAugust 2019 and 69 applications were received.  The number of applications per County is set out in Table 3.  My Department is currently finalising the assessment process in relation to the applications, carried out in conjunction with the Project Advisory Board for the Fund, which is comprised of representatives from key Government Departments and independent experts.  In that regard, I expect to be in a position to announce successful projects under the second call shortly. 

Table 1. Number of Applications under the First Call per County

Table 2.  Number of Projects Announced as Approved for Funding by County

Table 3.  Number of Applications under the Second Call per County