Michael Creed (Cork North West, Fine Gael)
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We promote Ireland as a good destination in all its glory in terms of seafood, the beef and dairy sectors and the drinks industry. We promote Ireland as the food island and do a lot of work in terms of market access, etc., which is as it should be. In terms of legislation, there is an initiative at EU level that is not insignificant and has been broadly welcomed by the industry in terms of taxing unfair trading practices because I share the view that primary producers and at the other end, consumers invariably end up in the weakest positions on that supply chain. Anything we can do in that space to create a fairer playing pitch is important.

The other thing we have done is make funding available to farmers through producer organisations. This is part of the infrastructure and architecture in other countries but is something whose possibilities we are only beginning to explore. We have approved a number of people to facilitate the establishment of producer organisations, which would not just enable negotiations in respect of specifications, etc., and engagement with meat plants but would also enable those producer organisations to address their cost base through group purchasing and so on. That is important and something on which we could make progress.