Mr. Eoin Deegan:

Ireland engages at several forums on the issue of GMOs at a competent authority level and also through the process of how GMOs are approved at EU level. There is a voting process there. I will have to defer to my colleague Ms Fleming but I am not aware of a specific issue on CRISPR-associated protein 9, Cas9, that it would have been dealt with as a GMO issue. Our policy on that at the moment is to avail of a derogation under the EU legislation. Obviously, we always act within the EU legislation and the framework policy that is there, but we, along with 19 member states, have taken a stance that we reserve the right not to allow GM crops to be cultivated here on a case-by-case basis.