Mr. Brian Rushe:

The Senator asked when we will be back before the committee to talk about food security. In my view, it will be in the not too distant future. We spoke about schemes today. Every single measure contained in the new CAP reform and new schemes results in reduced production if a farmer wants financial support.

When that starts happening to a farm, it continues to happen and that becomes the baseline. We have gone from a stage where we have supported and encouraged farmers in Europe and Ireland to produce a high quality, sustainably produced product that is world renowned for being safe to a point now where we are turning our back on that. We have a tunnel vision focus on the environment, emissions and focusing on agriculture and the only way that is being addressed by the Departments is to reduce production. I would argue that we can do both. We can increase and encourage production where people want to do so while delivering on the environment. It is a matter of funding and of supporting farmers to take up technology and supporting farmers adequately to deliver environmental goods and ecosystem services. The major flaw in our environmental schemes is how they are funded. They are based on an income forgone and a costs incurred metric. When one looks at it that way, for a farmer getting involved in an eco-scheme they take a measure, they incur the cost, they lose the income from taking that ground out of production and they are no better off. They are in effect, standing in the same place they were before. We have to start recognising where there is environmental delivery and to then pay the farmer for that. We need to support incomes. We have a proud tradition of food production in this country and farmers have a proud tradition of environmental sustainability and stewardship. We need to renew our focus on all three. It is a real fear of mine, when one looks back at the average age of farmers, as Macra na Feirme has rightly pointed out, as well as the lack of support, the lack of new entrants, the barriers to entry, rampant inflation and input costs. These are all inhibitors and road blocks for producing food. I think we will be back discussing this topic in a couple of years with a renewed focus on food security.