Mr. Tim Cullinan:

I will deal with the farm to fork strategy first. We all know the challenges we must deal with in that respect. This is another challenge coming from the European Commission, involving taking out land and putting 25% of European land into organic farming, with less fertiliser and pesticide being used. In itself, that will lead to less food produced in Europe. That is very worrying, given where the world is now. We have seen that over the past two years people have been trying to produce food in very difficult times during the Covid-19 pandemic. Now we see what is happening in Ukraine, which is known as the breadbasket of Europe because it produces grain in particular for the feeding of animals right across Europe and the world. I am very concerned about the farm to fork strategy.

We all acknowledge there are many challenges around climate change. We are working to meet those challenges but we must be very careful not to legislate ourselves into a position where we end up with a food scarcity, which may well happen.

If we continue on this journey, we may end up with a shortage of food. At that point, food will be at a price that the consumer will not be able to afford. We are clearly saying that the price of food has to go up. That is our position on farm to fork.