Mr. Dara Lynott:

We have been regulating genetically modified organism activities for the past 20 years. We have issued about 540 permits over the course of that period of 20 years. These have been issued in the main to academic institutions. On the question of how we assess risk, the legislation allows for four levels of risk, going from contained use, which is the vast majority of the facilities we regulate - these are activities within labs in academic institutions - right up to field trials. Currently we have only one activity under an active permit which is the Teagasc research into the prevention of potato blight. We are aided by EPA staff who are experts in this area and by a genetically modified organism advisory committee which helps us with difficult cases. We present dossiers from Europe to the committee for its opinion and to which we have regard when making our decisions. Over recent years we have noted a change in the pharmaceutical industry in Ireland which would have relied on chemical synthesis 20 years ago but quite a number of companies, including a new facility which opened in the old Dell factory in Limerick, use bio-synthesis, using mostly genetically modified organisms.

I am happy to answer any other questions in that area.