Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 29 May 2018

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine

Different Approaches and New Opportunities in Irish Agriculture: University College Dublin

3:00 pm

Ms Triona McCormack:

To pick up on the point of value flowing back to the producers, it is worth highlighting two things. The principle that we must see more value flow along that chain from producer to consumer is a fundamental principle within the circular bio-economy. The future of food and farming framework and legislation are important vehicles to see some of those changes at a European level which will then cascade into some of the member states. It is critically important that we all engage actively in that and in that dialogue that is happening to bring fairly practical policy solutions to some of this to enable this integration about which Professor Keane spoke between sustainability, the opportunities that are there, the environmental sustainability and the production sector and, critically, to enable that to be a sustainable business model for the primary producer. I said at the outset that it must be economically sustainable as well. The approach at which we are looking involves looking at the products that are coming out and asking how we cascade that back through the value chain and looking at different business models. Part of the data sets and the ownership of those sets can be part of that new business model. I might bring in Professor O'Riordan because this is an area that relates to value-added products in which she might have experience.