Mr. Brendan Price:

I worked on Parteen where I had the honour of working under Noel Rycroft, who was a brilliant scientist and fish manager. That was 35 or 36 years ago, but very little has improved since in open sea fish farming with the technology of the cages, etc. The arguments about them are still the same. I do not know what can be done with Parteen. Its future may be in something to do with freshwater aquaculture. However, it was a very exciting time and we really believed in it. It was a secondary objective of the ESB, its primary one being energy. It lapsed and largely was lost. If we are to believe Ken Whelan of the Marine Institute, by and large the Irish wild salmon is already gone. What we have are mixtures, hybrids, corrupted strains and all sorts of freaks coming back into our rivers and in lower and lower numbers. It is not a case of being frivolous about that, it is a reality. We have lost something. If one reads Fahy's Overkill!about fisheries generally, we have had boom, bust and crash. That is what I fear for with Irish aquaculture. If it is not a niche, quality and premium product, the chances are that the same thing will happen. The image of marine harvest leaving Chile could well be marine harvest leaving Ireland in ten years' time.

On the need for ongoing monitoring, of the European Maritime and Fisheries Fund, or EMFF, €30 million goes to aquaculture. Nothing goes to NGOs I might add, just to make the point again. I have forgotten the exact figures, but approximately €40 million goes to the Marine Institute and another approximately €20 million goes to the SFPA. I have forgotten the exact figures, but huge sums have gone to enforcement. It is approximately €40 million. This is all very well, but if that money can be found for these objectives to keep the resource in a sustainable condition and develop it, surely some of the money can be found for the National Parks and a Wildlife Service. I do not know what the politics of it are. Then, we would be working with the competent statutory authority to deal with these AAs. I will not say get rid of them but it is certainly about sidelining to the sovereign interest accreditations from the Aquaculture Stewardship Council, the Marine Stewardship Council and others like them. If we go with those accreditations without really being in control of what they are and they let us down at some stage, Origin Green itself will go.