Marcella Corcoran Kennedy (Offaly, Fine Gael)
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The challenges of climate change and the responses required were referred to earlier, as well as the conflicts between producing food while reducing our emissions and meeting our targets. Could Ireland produce its own ethanol? We have to increase the blend of ethanol in petrol over the next number of years, and the UK and Ireland are considering how to approach that. Is there any research on that issue?

There was an interesting presentation at a previous meeting about conservation agriculture and how some farmers are deciding to go down that route. Do the witnesses have any views on that or is there any research available on that issue?

There seems to be a shift away from the type of proteins that people are eating, and those being fed to animals. Someone referred to protein plants earlier. Are we doing enough to research what might work here in terms of animal and human consumption? I notice that milk is being replaced by things like soya milk and almond milk. Are we missing out on something by not growing more protein plants ourselves rather than importing them?

I recently came across the idea of vertical farming, which is quite common in Asia. It may sound a little extreme for Ireland, given that we have such lush land, but it has been taken up in different areas and it is something that we could perhaps think about.