Mr. Aidan O'Driscoll:

Speaking to some stakeholders recently, I described Brexit as the most important negotiation the agrifood sector has faced since the 1972 negotiations to enter the then EEC. I completely agree with the importance the Deputy attached to it. The UK accounts for approximately 40% of our agrifood exports. Some sectors are much more exposed than that. About 50% of our beef exports, for example, go to the UK. This is particularly crucial because the UK beef market is the highest priced beef market in the world. Accordingly, the importance of that to the beef sector is obvious.

Other subsectors, such as the mushroom industry, consumer foods and horticulture, are exposed sectors to the UK market in a number of different ways. Their exports are heavily concentrated on the UK but they are also subject to import competition from the UK.

Within the dairy sector, the exposure is somewhat less. Nevertheless, within some subsectors of that it is high. For example, we produce a lot of cheddar cheese in this country, of which 60% goes to the UK. This is a particular challenge because no one eats cheddar in such quantities. We cannot just divert the cheddar off to France. There are many challenges built into Brexit.

Have we done preparations for this? The Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine has pointed out on several occasions in public that the day he was appointed I handed him a large file of briefings, a large chunk of which were on Brexit. It showed the research work we had done well in advance of the UK referendum. We have been working hard on it since. We were one of the first, if not the first, Department to set up a dedicated Brexit unit. We have set up an elaborate process of consultation with stakeholders, which is our norm in major negotiations. We have done this before in Common Agricultural Policy, CAP, and trade negotiations. I must acknowledge the first-class quality of input we have received from farming and agrifood industry organisations, the co-ops and so on.

As for the negotiations, we are engaging in an intensive round of discussions with the Commission, other member states and with the UK and Northern Ireland to make clear to them how important this issue is to Ireland and to put forward our demand. Our demand is crystal clear. We want to retain unfettered access to the UK market after whatever happens. We also want to keep the UK market as a valuable market for the future.

We also have a major challenge on the fisheries front. The Common Fisheries Policy is a complex construct. In fisheries, one has this unique fact of a single common resource, the fish in the sea. That resource has to be divided up and the Common Fisheries Policy is how we do this. The UK accounts for a large proportion of EU fisheries waters. UK waters account for one third of the catch of Irish fishing boats, for example. The issues around fisheries are complex.

Are we doing any work on contingency planning? A second strand of the work we are doing involves engaging with the agriculture sector, but also with the Commission and with our colleagues in the UK, especially in Northern Ireland, on the practicalities of managing any kind of border with exports and imports after Brexit. I have told several sectoral groups that we have to negotiate strongly and clearly for the absolutely best outcome. We also have to prepare for the worst outcome.

It would be foolish not to do both of those things. That is a flavour of what we are doing. I am happy to elaborate in more detail if the Deputy wishes.