Since the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Deputy McConalogue, is present, I would like to ask a question about the new agri-climate rural environment scheme, ACRES. For too long, we have penalised and docked payments for farmers for having bits of habitat on their land. For the first time ever, we have a proper agri-environmental scheme in ACRES that will actually reward farmers for working with biodiversity, with payments of over €10,000 in co-operation areas. Outside the co-operation areas there will be payments of up to €7,000 per farmer per year. At the moment, it is expected that only approximately 30,000 applicants will be admitted into the scheme. However, 46,000 farmers have applied to get into this scheme, which proves that farmers want to work with biodiversity and want to farm in an environmentally friendly manner. I ask that the capacity of ACRES be increased and that we allow 46,000 farmers to participate in the scheme.

I thank Deputy Christopher O’Sullivan for raising this issue, for which he has been a great advocate. It has also been a key priority for the Government, as well as for the three parties in government. The uptake in appetite among farm families for the scheme has proven very strong. We have had 46,000 applicants, when the expectation was that we would have approximately 30,000 in the first tranche. I would love to bring all 46,000 in. We want to be able to enable all farm families to participate in this and to back them both in their farm incomes and by working to contribute to the environment.

There are a number of issues that need to be worked through to see if that is possible. The first is the budget and the second is the process and the capacity of the system as to whether it will be able to manage that, to ensure it gets up and running smoothly, that it works well and that people get paid on time. I am looking at all those issues. I do not know yet whether it will be possible. If it is possible, I would like to do it. It is great to see such a strong response from the farming community. As we always have done, we will continue to back farm families both financially and in making a contribution to emissions reduction and to ecosystem services.