Mr. Tim Cullinan:

The core of the issue is a farmer having a margin. During procurement, retailers have to build in the cost of production. Somebody will have to have the authority to establish the cost of production. We have a State body, Teagasc, which I believe would be well able to come up with the cost of production. That will vary. We currently see substantial inflation in the cost of production for feed, fuel and fertiliser for all sectors. That has impacted more on some sectors than others. I sat in front of numerous retailers earlier in the year. There were issues with contracts and so on. Everybody was looking at what could be done to keep primary producers in production. We made that point too. Things will change due to weather events, substantial inflation and the Russian war in Ukraine, which has had a huge impact on all sectors. Flexibility is needed. We need a facilitator that can establish, if the cost of production is going up, that a retailer cannot be allowed to procure for below the cost of production. That is critically important.