Mr. Pat Cleary:

Let me answer Deputy Martin Kenny's questions first. We thank Deputies for their questions because they are drilling right down into the difficulties we see.

A question was asked about sugar beet and from where we obtained our information on the greenhouse gas statistics. We used the Environment Food and Rural Affairs Committee of the House of Commons, EFRA. We also looked at the EU statistics for arable crops which were most beneficial to greenhouse gas filtration.

The other element is the long growing season.

Mr. Carter referred to it. For those who are not familiar with the crop, there is a long growing season. A lot is grown in Ireland for feed. It is not just a commercial sugar crop. It has large roots and leaves. It is planted in March and grows until harvest time, which is normally from the end of October or November until January. As well as being a carbon filter, it provides significant habitat cover for wildlife in the autumn and summer.

Another significant element is linked to the beef and dairy sector. The capacity of the crop to absorb nutrients and synthetic or organic fertiliser is four times that of any other cereal crop. In terms of the arable sector in general, people are talking about the additional difficulties this winter given the excess of slurry and the lack of capacity for storage. The arable sector has great capacity, but there needs to be a lot of engagement between the arable areas of the country and areas where there are significant slurry storage capacity problems.

Deputy Cahill referred to the sustainability of our sector. On-farm diversification is important. We need to examine anaerobic digestion because it has the capacity to utilise extra slurry or surplus sugar beet or maize as a source of material to generate gas. Some in the transport sector are already converting HGVs to biogas. On-farm anaerobic digestion needs to be examined and resourced more. There is a major issue in terms of implementation and planning for on-farm anaerobic digestion. There is significant capacity in that area. It will not happen if we all sit in our own sectors. There needs to be joined-up thinking, as Deputy Cahill said.

There is capacity in our sector to produce first generation biofuels. An EU directive which was implemented ten years ago was never enacted. I know some people who set up companies to produce pure plant oil from oilseed rape plants. The refit tariff was pulled and many went out of business as a result. It is the simplest form of conversion. Oilseed rape is crushed and pure plant oil can be blended to use with diesel. It is a very simple process. The cake which is left can be used as a high-protein animal feed. That is one simple on-farm mechanism to add value to a product we produce. It is a solution which we have ignored over the past few years. Many biofuels are being produced from sugar beet and wheat on the Continent. A significant amount of wheat is going into ethanol in France. We are not talking about using our cereal crop for the biofuels sector because we need to produce feed for our livestock. There is capacity to expand. In order to survive in our sector we need diversification. The more we can do on-farm to add value to any product we produce, the more sustainable we will be in the future.