Martin Conway (Fine Gael)

I also welcome the Minister. It is a great compliment to a Minister when a leading farmer comments, as one did to me recently, that the biggest worry in the farming industry is that Deputy Simon Coveney will be promoted to some other Department and the industry will lose him. Apparently, the Minister spoke for an hour and a half, without notes, at a dairy producers' conference in Cork. He won the hearts and minds of everyone present. It was most impressive. He is obviously taking to his office very well. Certainly, farmers in Ireland are extremely receptive.

It is an important Ministry; it is one of the key Ministries for driving our economic recovery. One hears talk about green shoots in the economy, but we have seen them already in farming. There has been a transformation in the last couple of years through a combination of education, better means of production and greater awareness of waste and what can potentially be achieved. It is great that average farm income is improving, although it still has a long way to go.

There are a couple of areas in which I have a particular interest. The first is the retail food sector. Senator John Crown referred to calorie labelling of food, for which we have a moral and ethical responsibility to provide. It should not be an issue for debate, rather it should simply be done.

With regard to the sale of food, we generally adhere to a very high standard in food quality, both in the food purchased in supermarkets and the food served in restaurants. The facilities in Irish restaurants are far ahead of what one would find in Italy, although Italian food is also good. We seem to have over-regulated the food industry. One can easily get a bowl of pasta in a café bar in Italy, but people in the food industry in this country say the environmental health requirements are completely over the top and are not conducive to the cost-efficient production and sale of food. Some of the requirements are off the wall. Safe food is extremely important. The majority of people in the food business produce safe food but they find that red tape causes them difficulty. I am not sure if this is the Minister's responsibility, but I know the Government is working to ensure that overall policy is proper, fair and reasonable.

I spoke about the quality of farming. I remind the House of one area of which I know the Minister is aware. In the Burren, in County Clare, the Farming for Conservation project involves farmers who are producing extremely high quality food in an environmentally friendly way. They are ambassadors for tourism as well as being in the food production business. They are earning their living from the land but preserving it for future generations. They are respecting the flora and fauna that has made the Burren famous and are acting as real-life tour guides. The agritourism business has huge potential.

I would consider our unique farming methods and the expertise we have developed as intellectual property which we could sell to the Asian markets, including China. We will never be in a position to supply the food requirements of China. If the whole of Ireland was producing at 100% capacity, we would not supply a suburb of a major city in China. However, we could teach the Chinese how we do it here, and do that on a long-term basis. There are many ways of reaping an economic benefit from what we do and from the knowledge we could pass on.

It is a shame to see the amount of food that is thrown out every day.