Mr. Tadhg Buckley:

It completely depends. It is very difficult to say that because there is a whole host of other issues that affect water quality, like hydromorphology and climate. The other thing about it is that at the moment we look at water quality at an entire catchment level. We should be looking at it at a sub-catchment level. In fairness, if you take where I am from on the Cork-Kerry border, the catchment we are in is the Blackwater catchment. That enters the sea in Youghal, so it is a massive catchment. We should certainly be looking at sub-catchment level, and we also need to fully understand the different impacts that are actually happening at all catchment levels. At the moment, we certainly do not have enough of an understanding with regard to what is happening across all the catchments. The Teagasc catchment programme has been really good in demonstrating, in different catchments, the impacts that different measures have had. Unfortunately, we cannot say that in 15 months' time, this is going to have this impact because there is a whole host of other aspects going on.

The other thing we want is the right measures to be put in place. Based on research, if you are reducing, a blanket reduction in stocking rates is not the panacea to solving levels. There are better ways of doing this, as demonstrated under the ASSAP programme where there were priority actions taken that had a really positive effect on water quality, without having any impact on stocking levels. That is the key thing we need to look at. We need to look at implementing more appropriate measures and we need to do this at a widespread level. We need to do this nationally. The ASSAP programme is very good but it needs to be ramped up. Farmers need to be given the time, and we also need to put the supports in place with regard to allowing all farmers to be able put in place slurry storage. That is one of the key things we need to do to make sure we can maximise nutrients and protect produce.