Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Wednesday, 26 October 2022
Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine
Vision for the Future of Irish Farming: Macra na Feirme
Mr. John Keane:
I am aware of it and of a number of other research pieces that are ongoing in other parts of the country on a smaller scale.
To take the first question addressed to Mr. Hanrahan on integration at an EU level, it probably links back to this point again. Our European partners through the European Council of Young Farmers, CEJA, could have, on a specialised beef or a dairy farm, three of four sources of income coming onto that farm. This income could come from supplying an anaerobic digester, solar panels feeding the grid, the creation of wind energy and from their main - if you want to call it that - enterprise of beef or dairy farming. That is what integration looks like to us. The anaerobic digester is an opportunity for farmers to be able to get an alternative source of income. As far back as 2010, none of three of us were involved in Macra na Feirme at that stage so we cannot take any credit for it.