Mr. Pat McCormack:

I thank Deputy Ring for his question. The 25% target is a significant ambition. We had an opportunity to set it at 22%. My colleague, Mr. John Enright, and I sit on the dairy vision group and the beef and lamb vision group. It is a significant challenge. The Teagasc marginal abatement cost curve, MACC, will carry us a long way, to 16%, 17% or 18%, but that is subject to having complete buy-in. The ruminant additive will deliver substantial gains if it is approved by the Environmental Protection Agency but it comes at a substantial cost to the primary producer. I will use the figure of 100 cows, whether suckler or dairy, because it is easiest from a mathematical perspective. It would cost that farmer between €10,000 and €12,000 per annum in investment in the ruminant additive alone to get that level of reduction. I live near to the Teagasc Solohead research farm, where it has done much good work on clover and multi-species swards, but they all come at a substantial cost. As my colleague, Mr. John Enright, said, there is no money from the Government on the table.

I will not get into the politics of this. I was invited, on behalf of the ICMSA, to attend a public meeting in Mitchelstown last Friday night. Two of Deputy Ring's parliamentary colleagues who were there said this was a Government approach, not driven by one minority party. There needs to be some joined-up thinking if it is the right thing to do. It is not that long since environmental aspirations were inaugurated under the previous Government, out in the Aviva Stadium. The then Taoiseach, who is now the Tánaiste, spoke about Ireland being a food island. Unfortunately, some Deputies, including urban, rural, Green and traditional farm Deputies, have forgotten what we are good at and what drives our economy. Some 170,000 people are employed in rural Ireland directly as a result of agriculture. We are in danger of undermining the viability of the family farm. If that is decimated, which is a potential outcome of all these proposals, our sectors, whether dairy or beef, will fall. We need the throughput from those family farms for the industry to remain viable.