Patricia Ryan (Kildare South, Sinn Fein)
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265. To ask the Minister for Rural and Community Development the status of the Athy food hub; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [23357/21]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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I am assuming that the Deputy is referring to the application for the Athy Food Hub made by Kildare County Council as part of the third call for Category 1 applications to the Rural Regeneration and Development Fund, which closed on 1st December 2020.

Category 1 relates to ambitious, large-scale projects capital projects which have all the necessary planning and other development consents in place on the closing date for applications. However, as part of this call for applications the date for the confirmation of planning and other consents was extended to 26^thFebruary 2021, in order to take account of the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. Applications that did not have planning and consents in place by this date were deemed ineligible. The Athy Food Hub was one such application.

Arising from this Category 1 call, in April I announced funding for 25 successful projects which will receive funding of €81 million from the Fund and provide total investment in rural areas of just under €100 million. To date, the Fund has provided €249 million for 164 projects across the country, worth a total of €338 million.

In terms of future plans, I will be announcing a call for Category 2 applications – relating to project development funding - in the coming weeks and a further call for Category 1 applications will be announced later in 2021.