Gillian Toole (Meath East, Independent)
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608. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine whether the expansion of TAMS farm solar grants is being examined to assist reduce agricultural & horticultural cost bases, thereby reducing the cost of food production consumer costs. [68074/26]

Martin Heydon (Kildare South, Fine Gael)
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The Targeted Agriculture Modernisation Scheme (TAMS) is a demand-led scheme with a defined budgetary allocation. The budgetary allocation for TAMS 3 is spread across all eleven sub schemes therefore it is not possible to allocate a budget to each of the eleven schemes individually.

TAMS 3 has been hugely successful to date, with over €193 million issuing to farmers since payments commenced in June 2024. Over the first eight tranches of the scheme, all valid applications received were approved.

However to ensure the available budget for TAMS 3 is distributed fairly over the remainder of the current CAP programming period, it was necessary to limit the number of approved applications per tranche from Tranche 9 onwards by applying ranking and selection criteria to manage the budget to the end of 2027.

Specifically in respect of the Solar Capital Investment Scheme (SCIS) the number of applications and the level of funding provided to date has also well exceeded expectations, to the extent that more than 20% of the TAMS budget is being spent on SCIS. To date a total of 3,787 SCIS applications have received approval to proceed with their investment while payments amounting to €39.5 million have issued to 2,107 farmers.

Given the need to manage the remaining budget available for TAMS 3, in recent tranches I have prioritised approvals for core on-farm investments related to farm safety and nutrient storage on the basis of the importance of continued investment in these measures. As a consequence, 100% of eligible applications under Farm Safety and circa 75% of nutrient storage investments have received approval in recent tranches while approvals for other measures have been at lower levels including SCIS applications.

Aindrias Moynihan (Cork North-West, Fianna Fail)
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609. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the amount paid under the forgotten farmers scheme to date. [68107/26]

Aindrias Moynihan (Cork North-West, Fianna Fail)
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610. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the number of farmers that have benefitted from the forgotten farmer scheme to date; and the number and amounts paid by county. [68103/26]

Martin Heydon (Kildare South, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 609 and 610 together.

The scheme to support Long Established Young Farmers (LEYF) closed for submission of online application on 13th August 2025.

The number of farmers that have benefited from the Long Established Young Farmers scheme is 445, with a total value of payments of €2,225,000. The table below provides the detail of the number and amounts paid over to each county: