331. Deputy Tom Barry asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine when the GLAS scheme will be fully operational. [4579/15]

GLAS (the Green Low-carbon Agri-environment Scheme) is part of a suite of proposed measures under Ireland’s Rural Development Programme (RDP) which was submitted to the European Commission in July. The Commission services notified us of their detailed observations on the draft Programme at the end of October last year, to which my Department provided immediate and detailed replies. Since then, bilateral discussions have been ongoing with the Commission with the objective of securing approval for the Irish Programme at the earliest possible date. Once approval is granted, my Department will move to open the Scheme as soon as possible.