Mr. Joe Condon:

We would like to outline that a lot of good work is happening in farming and on farms, and it is evidenced in this document that the biodiversity is in a healthy condition basically on our members' farms.

There are other areas around the country that would fall into that category as well, in the mountainous regions, and in the south and south west of the country. There are a lot of schemes, and a lot of data being measured on farms. The NPWS are involved in this data measurement and in many instances of the figures that are coming up there is a scorecard reading six out of ten on a biodiversity scale. There is room for improvement, but I do not think the story is as negative perhaps as some of the predictions that are being made.