Mr. Martin Stapleton:

On finance, our big campaign for the past year, which will be ongoing, is to make sure that competitive finance is available to farmers. It is clear to us that rates are, on average, approximately 2% higher in Ireland than they are in north-western Europe and those are the people we compete with on the European market. It is a significant charge. There are different types of finance, as I am sure the committee knows, including finance for capital investment, for increasing the size and scale of a farm and purchasing land, and for working capital. On the question of Sparkassen, we would welcome its participation in the Irish market to provide a new source of funds. The most important part is that if Sparkassen is to come here, it will have to be competitive. It will have to help drive down rates. The funding model for Sparkassen may mean that it will not be available for long-term capital investment but it should certainly be a big help at the level we are talking about with working capital. Traditionally and currently, banks' overdraft rates are between 7% and 9% and merchant credit is often charged at as high a rate as 1% a month, which is compounded to 13% to 13.5%. Any time that we see an opportunity to increase competition in this market is a benefit not only for our sector but for all of our economy. That has to be seen as being a good thing.

I agree with the Senator about renewable energy. The time has come for investment at farm level to produce renewable energy in this country. For far too long, we have let our contribution or investment into renewable energy be put into huge companies. One can see that with wind farms. It is also the case with solar panel development where solar farms at the moment are run by big businesses where farms have been leased long-term and solar panels have been installed. It would be innovative for us to incentivise farmers to put solar panels on the roof and to get involved in community projects such as putting in anaerobic digestion which has the potential to reduce our carbon output significantly and so allow farmers to play their part in meeting our renewable targets. I will defer to Mr. McDonald.