Mr. Ger Breen:

Bord na Móna has a long association with professional growers in Ireland. To set out two key aspects, we bought professional grade horticultural peat and provided mixing plants so that we might manufacture ready-made compost to meet the needs of our customers. Given our long association, we are aware of the challenges posed to Irish growers. We have been looking to see what we can do within our remit. I am glad to be able to report that Bord na Móna and ICL have entered into a lease agreement for the professional growing media manufacturing facility at our Coolnamona facility and for the supply of professional horticultural peat to that facility. ICL supplies sustainable growing media to professional and ornamental growers and plant propagators across the country. It operates in the professional market, not the retail market, and specialises in this sector.

One might ask, "Why ICL?". It is one of the leading suppliers in the professional growing business in the UK and Ireland and has been supplying raw materials to the sector for many years. Like us, it has been aware of change coming down the tracks and limited peat being used in future. In recent years, it has conducted extensive research into sustainable professional growing media that enable Irish growers to continue production. It has also made substantial investments in new technology.

The leasing of this facility, the supply of professional peat that is earmarked for the Irish market only and the use of wood fibre products to sustain brands through the use of Fibagro Advance wood fibre technology will allow for a transition programme that enables Irish producers to move from peat-based products to non-peat-based products over a number of years, all subject to the extensive research insights that ICL brings to the marketplace, for example, the pioneering innovative wetting agents that it is developing and, in terms of the fertiliser Osmocote, controlled release neutral technologies that will optimise product performance. ICL has been looking into alternative products, reducing the percentage of peat within those and their impact on the crops that professional growers are trying to grow. This should enable professional growers, if they wish, to source a product in the Republic of Ireland.