Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

We are still carrying out many testing programmes on carcasses to ensure that we are monitoring and on top of that, but it is down. The actual test is not a big expense; compensation is the main expense. Sorry; I am referring to TB. BSE testing represents small money.

Deputy Deering asked me about the fodder crisis. Let us recall when the fodder crisis arose. It had been predicted because we had an extraordinary weather pattern involving a very bad winter, no summer and then straight back into another very wet winter. There was virtually no break for farmers for almost 18 months. Land was totally sodden. Then we had a late spring.

We had virtually no grass growth in much of the country and even where there was growth, the ground was too wet to put animals out on it. An extraordinary number of weather patterns, one after the other, added hugely to the problem. We learned significant lessons from this. We are now in a very healthy position and have been all year in terms of fodder. We had a great summer last year and again this year, the inverse of what happened previously. We had a mild and relatively dry winter and probably the best grass growth ever this year. Some farmers are taking four cuts of silage.

We are entering winter this year in a healthy state from a stock point of view. Teagasc now conducts a national audit of fodder availability at intervals to ensure we are properly prepared. We will not always have summers like that we have just had and need to prepare for the kind of nightmare scenario and weather patterns we had two years ago and ensure we have enough fodder in stock next time. We do not want to have to import grass from France and the United Kingdom. From our perspective, that is a bit like Eskimos importing snow. We should never find ourselves in that position again. Farmers, dairy farmers in particular, have learned lessons from what happened.