Michael Comiskey (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank Mr. Collins for the interesting presentation. A lot of the points have been covered.

We all will be aware that 2015 has been a difficult year for farmers, especially those who made significant investments. They were all coming to us then during the serious crisis that they experienced - we agree it was a terrible problem for them - to see what we could do to help them out.

According to the graph, we see the amount of product that was going into the Russian market. I wonder what are the possibilities - it is out of Mr. Collins's hands - of us getting the Russian market reopened. We talked about the blip in China as well. That was only short term. Those are the elements that would really help us along and get markets, which is what we need to do.

On the intervention price, there was a lot of talk a few months ago about getting that price up to 27 cent or 28 cent to take some of the pressure off the farmers who were in serious bother. Could the fixed-price contracts Mr. Collins mentioned kick in again and help farmers who would be encountering difficulties?