Ms Geraldine O'Sullivan:

Mr. Rushe makes a good point. Ireland is ranked 23rd out of the 27 EU member states in on-farm renewables. We have a very low level of adoption of community farm-based renewables and we typically have larger companies coming in. We are not taking advantage of spreading the wealth and having communities and farmers directly involved. It is something we need to have addressed because the social and rural development benefits from that are proven in countries that have supported that mechanism throughout Europe.

On the opportunities in climate change, we need to transform the supply chain. This has very much been talked about as part of climate change, that we improve the equity within the supply chain, because the only way we can fund the transformation is by producers getting a greater share of the supply chain so that we can develop that sustainability.

Mr. Rushe mentioned carbon farming and ecosystem services payments. These are opportunities that are available. We would need to understand funding mechanisms and markets as to how we would develop these in the longer term, but we have those opportunities.