Mr. Donal Maguire:

I am afraid my answers will probably disappoint the Senator. Most of the ground he covered falls within the sphere of influence or business of Bord Iascaigh Mhara.

As the Senator is probably aware, the question of licensing for a gatherer's rights is a matter for the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government and not the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine. As a result, we do not have any particular involvement. The development of that sector is really a matter for Údarás na Gaeltachta and not for BIM. Our interest in seaweed is almost exclusively focused on farm seaweed.

If it is acceptable to the committee, I will move on to the question about integrated multitrophic aquaculture. As I mentioned to the Chairman earlier, we held a very successful seminar in Limerick a couple of weeks ago where 220 delegates looked at the potential specifically for farm seaweed. We had an open session the following day on the greater seaweed industry. A whole range of potential synergies could be achieved by twining up existing mussel farms and turning some of their production space over to the production of seaweed. That appears to be a good model particularly if we can perfect the culture techniques for some of the higher value red seaweeds which they could grow there. That is certainly a success.

The other concept is to use seaweed farming in the vicinity of finfish farms because seaweed is a terrific way of soaking up nutrients out of the water. In areas where there might be some concern about nutrients coming off a finfish farm and a marine finfish farm, the seaweed aquaculture would be an excellent accompaniment and would benefit the speed and lush growth of the seaweed.