Pat Deering (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the delegation. The presentation was concise and to the point. It could be summed up by saying that there are two main issues: education and the availability of land.

I am interested in the figures for the age profile of farmers, a major issue at present. Are those figures slightly out of date, considering the agricultural colleges have been bursting at the seams in recent times? There are many more farmers' sons who five or six years ago were content to mix cement and build walls but who are happy now to return home and work on the family farm. The agricultural colleges are overstretched, so are the figures up to date? The figures for 2010 might already be out of touch.

Education is essential if we are to achieve the objectives in the Food Harvest 2020 strategy. That is only a few short years away at this stage so we must be ready for it. To be ready, however, education is crucial. How does the Minister think we could encourage more farmers to go to college? Where would there be other prospects apart from college? Colleges are stretched so is there any way, through Teagasc or a similar body, that we could see other educational elements being added to the system to help young farmers coming into the system?

There is no doubt we all agree about the barriers to land access. It is essential that more and more tax incentives are put in place to allow for land mobility, particularly from a dairying point of view. There are ambitious targets for dairying in Food Harvest 2020, and to increase dairy production we must have all the land together. Measures must be put in place to ensure that happens. Other farms involved in the production of beef or sheep meat could work far from each other, but in dairying it is essential that all the land is around the milking parlour.