Jackie Cahill (Tipperary, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the representatives of Teagasc for a most informative presentation. I have a few different questions. The first is about the graph which showed the increased proportion of beef that will come from the dairy herd. Are there figures for four or five years' time? Has Teagasc projected where the dairy herd size will go and what will be the size of the suckler herd? A figure on the graph showed how much live exports have gone up but do the witnesses have a figure for what they expect or what the potential is for the next four to five years of further expansion? While the graph showed there is an increased proportion, I would like to get more meat on those statistics.

The second point I want to make, which is a bit of a criticism, is about the economic breeding index, EBI, to which the witnesses referred. In recent years, little or no value has been put on the index on the beef side. Whether it is on the carcass value of the cow at culling or the value of the calf at sale, there definitely must be a policy adjustment in the calculation of the EBI. At the end of the day, the EBI should reflect the profitability of a farm and if we have a 20% replacement rate for cows, a cow should be replaced every five years. The value on the carcass between a good Friesian cow and a Jersey cross cow has not been in the EBI index and that also needs to be rectified. The negative side of cross-breeding on beef genetics has not been economically evaluated to the extent I would like or that would influence farmers' decisions on breeding.

The third point is on live exports. While I am open to correction, my understanding of live exports is that Jersey crosses are not welcome, whether they are from a Jersey cow or a Jersey dam. The veal units on the Continent do not want these animals and when a number of them got there in the past, their performance put a threat on our whole business relationship with the veal units. Has there been evaluation of those calves? Have they any potential for the veal units or are they an absolute no-go area?

The income figures that were given on the profit per hectare and the increase in recent years where people were involved in various discussion groups, were the real eye-opener for me in that presentation. Is there a breakdown of the figures that were given on farmers involved in knowledge transfer groups and so on as to whether they are full-time farmers or on their acreage? A lot of figures were given on the size of farmers involved in beef production and I would like to know whether there is a co-relation with the knowledge transfer or if the larger beef farmers are getting involved in the knowledge transfer programme. It was clear from the figures that were shown that the knowledge transfer had a huge input into the income per hectare, and at the end of the day, that is absolutely key. The amount of dairy farmers involved in discussion groups and the percentage of beef farmers involved in the same is fairly minute. We have had the beef data and genomics programme, which has an incentive but there was a lot of resistance to it in the past. Have the views of dairy farmers improved as regards participation in that programme? Can Teagasc suggest ways in which we can get a substantial increase in the number of farmers partaking in its scheme?

What is the membership of beef farmers in Teagasc? It may be an unfair question to Professor O'Mara, but does he feel that farmers, and beef farmers especially, only have a link with Teagasc for the purpose of filling out forms and to make sure they are involved with the green, low-carbon, agri-environment scheme, GLAS, and various other schemes? Is Teagasc seeing any increase in the participation in these knowledge transfer groups? The figures that showed the improvement the profitability over a short period were startling. We will be arguing here about five or ten cent per kilogram in beef price but the increased efficiency in the graphs shown was very significant. There are some questions. This committee was in Moorepark a couple of months ago and I raised questions then about the focus in our dairy research farms on cross-breeding. Has there been a realignment of that focus or does Teagasc still perceive cross-breeding to be a key part of the dairy research in the future? What are its implications on our beef output and has the evaluation of that increased?