Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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146. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the number of applications to the organic payment scheme received by his Department from Galway city and county to date; the number approved; the number refused and the reasons therefor; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [13803/25]

Martin Heydon (Kildare South, Fine Gael)
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In the new CAP Strategic Plan for the period 2023-2027, funding of €256 million has been allocated to the Organic Farming Scheme - approximately a five-fold increase from the previous CAP. This increase in allocation is to support farmers converting to, and maintaining, organic farming practices. Over the past three years there has been a trebling of the numbers farming organically, and the land area now stands at approximately 248,000 hectares.

In common with all schemes, there are terms and conditions with which farmers must comply. No farmer who meets the requirements of the Organic Farming Scheme has been refused entry.

A total of 420 farmers from Galway city and county are currently participating in the Organic Farming Scheme, representing 7.5% of all scheme participants. The numbers refused entry to the scheme under the new CAP Strategic Plan for failure to comply with the terms and conditions were 'zero' in 2023, sixteen in 2024 and five in 2025.

Rose Conway-Walsh (Mayo, Sinn Fein)
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147. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine when all outstanding ACRES payments will be made; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [13812/25]

Martin Heydon (Kildare South, Fine Gael)
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More than €440 million has been paid to ACRES participants to date. A total of €247.4 million has been paid to 42,631 participants (25,537 General and 17,094 Co-operation), or 95% of all ACRES participants, in respect of their participation in the Scheme in 2023. A further 2,302 farmers have yet to receive their final payments for 2023. Of these, 2,008 have already received an interim payment of either €4,000 or €5,000, respectively. In many instances, this will cover the entire payment due.

I can confirm that advance payments totalling €193.5 million have now been paid to 44,939 farmers in respect of their participation in ACRES in 2024. This number represents 83% of all ACRES participants. Advance payments in respect of scheme participation in 2024 have still to be made to 9,316 ACRES participants across the two tranches.

Certain issues such as transfers of contracts, late or non-submission of scorecards, and alignment of ACRES information with data held by the Department on other IT systems, have contributed to the delay in the making of those payments.

My Department is actively resolving the remaining issues through, for example, the development of the required IT functionality, the re-allocation of resources and the investigation of issues associated with specific contracts. In in some cases, action is required by the participant to progress the payment claim.

Pay runs are taking place every 10 days in order to ensure that these payments are issued in a timely manner as cases pass the required validations.

My Department will be issuing regular online updates over the coming period on the progress being made, with the expectation of having the payments in respect of farmers’ participation in ACRES in 2023 and 2024 made by the end of June.

I can assure you that everything is being done to pay, as soon as possible, all ACRES participants who clear pre-payment checks.