Mr. Kevin Comiskey:

I thank the Chair and Senator Paul Daly. He is always willing to meet us. We met in his county and in mine. I thank him for that. He touched on organics. It is a bit of a chicken and egg situation, to have the supplier, do you not have the supply. If you have the shelf space, you need to have the supply for the shelf space. Someone asked who was to blame for that. Bord Bia and processors both have a role to play. Bord Bia's role is to get the markets and the shelf space and that of the processors then is pay the extra premium to the supplier. Regarding milking and whether there is a position on that and whether other farmers would take up milking sheep like Mr. Brendan Crosse and Mr. Michael Crosse, who I compliment for their initiative in milk in the sheep industry, there is, more than definitely. However, who is going to do it? It is going to be lads like Brendan and Michael. The generation you see around the sheep marts at the minute is certainly not going to do it. How do you get young farmers like these lads into the sector? It is through building confidence and support, which is what we are all about here today, encouraging young farmers. I have a young son and he is very interested in it but cannot see a viable income in it at the moment. If it was supported, possibly there would be. As Mr. Bourke pointed out, there is a lot of talk about food security, which is very important. Financial security is equally important for the primary producer. If you do not have financial security for the primary producer, you are heading nowhere.

On the €30 payment, as I said earlier about the dog campaign, I was on the committee for six years before I became chairman. We initiated that at the time and got going. We looked for a €30 payment and secured from rural development funding the old sheep welfare scheme of €10 per head. We have constantly asked, since 2016, for that to be built on and brought up to €30. If you took inflation into account, it would go even further. The IFA has been very strong on the supports needed in that area. I thank the Chairman.