Matt Carthy (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)
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211. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine further to Parliamentary Question No. 1961 of 14 June 2022, his proposals to address the continued undersubscription of the organic processing investment grant scheme; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [34740/22]

Charlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail)
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The Organic Processing Investment Grant Scheme provides funding to processors who wish to invest in developing facilities for the processing, preparation, grading, packing and storage of organic products. It is a demand led scheme and all eligible applications received are assessed based on the terms and conditions of the scheme.

I am fully committed to the development of the organic sector in Ireland.  The current Programme for Government contains a commitment to align Ireland’s organic land area with that of the current EU average of approximately 7.5% over the lifetime of this Government.  This I believe will lead to a corresponding increase in applications for funding in the organic processing sector and I will ensure there is sufficient budget in place to meet this anticipated increase in demand.

Minister of State Pippa Hackeet will lead a high-level trade mission to Germany next month for the organic sector to help promote organic Irish food and drink in the German market. It is through initiatives like these that we will continue to develop the sector at production and processing level. 

Matt Carthy (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)
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212. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine further to Parliamentary Question No. 1963 of 14 June 2022, the reason for the continued decrease in total and average payments from the organic farming scheme between 2018 and 2022; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [34741/22]

Charlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail)
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The current Organic Farming Scheme provides for contracts of five year duration for farmers who are converting to organic farming practices.  A higher in conversion payment is provided for the first two years while a reduced maintenance payment rate is provided for the remainder of the contract.

The decrease in average payment per participant in the Organic Farming Scheme can be accounted for by the number of farmers who were previously on the higher in-conversion rate when they joined the scheme initially and have now moved to the maintenance rate..  As a result, with each passing year there is an overall higher percentage of farmers on the lower maintenance rate.

I have proposed an allocation of €256 million for the Organic Farming Scheme. This level of funding will facilitate enhanced payments to all organic farmers, which will further support maintenance and conversion to Organic Farming and assist in achieving our target of 7.5% of land cover under organic production by 2027.