Mr. Shane Fitzgerald:

I agree with everything Mr. Keane said. The energy and water usage on our farm is also measured annually. We will have figures on our farm showing exactly how much water or energy we used to produce a litre of milk. In the programme for Government and different action plans there were references to a food strategy such as a sustainability-type plan for all farms and figures coming from the national farm survey. If all those data can be linked into the figures, say, for the processors, that can be used on labels. People have also had other ideas. Mr. Keane mentioned communicating the message through the use of smartphones. For example, if there a code such as a QR code on a carton of milk to say it was produced on our farm, the customer could use their phone to bring them to a website that would show our farm and the exact carbon footprint used to produce that milk. The customer might be willing to pay a premium for that product and that would be our hope. Technology will play a part in this. I am always passionate about bring people to farms and communicating all we do on farms to improve sustainability. If it is possible to reach the consumer directly in the way Mr. Keane described, it would be definitely a good idea.

I know exactly what Deputy Whitmore was saying. It can be confusing and complicated. If I go into a shop to pick up an item I find it difficult to see where it has been sourced. There are many different types of labels on items. You might know an item has been quality assured but you do not know exactly to what standard it has been produced. That type of initiative can only be a positive. It would have to be based on facts and figures and science. It cannot be a free-for-all either, as some farmers are not producing to a certain standard. We would need to have the data on it. That will be another key aspect of the signpost farm programme. Eventually we will have all these data and information from our farms, which many other countries will not have. Once we get all these figures on water usage, energy usage and carbon sequestration, Irish farms will come out on top. I think we will be world leaders once we have all these verifiable data. The consumer needs to know that and we need to tell our story in as many ways as possible. It is definitely a great idea.