Mr. Jim O'Toole:

I thank the Deputy for his good wishes. On the first question about the sheep market, as I mentioned earlier, we just completed promotional activity in the domestic market over the last number of weeks in response to the particular difficulties, of which we are very aware, concerning the sheep sector. We are coming into the period of the Muslim festival of Ramadan, which starts today, and the Easter festivities which will happen in the Christian calendar in the next few weeks. Building through, we anticipate a period of higher demand. We have seen some increases in the prices for lambs over recent weeks, which we hope can be sustained. We hope we are through the worst of the particular issues the sector has faced in the last number of weeks. We keep that under constant review. If demanded, we will seek to increase further the promotional activity or repeat some of the exercises we have done to try to sustain the market.

On the question about the alcoholic drinks sector and whiskey in particular, we have seen a significant increase in alcoholic drink exports in the last year, just knocking on the door of €2 billion worth of exports, of which more than €1.1 billion, if memory serves me right, was Irish whiskey. There are now 44 distilleries on the island of Ireland. There is significant growth in the market. Not only are we increasing the spread of markets and value to markets, we are also premiumising by tapping into higher-value niches for premium Irish whiskeys. In recent years there has been a successful period for the whiskey sector, which we are delighted to support. One activity we are involved in particularly is the Spirit of Ireland promotion. We run it successfully in several markets, particularly in the US, where we have a whole presentation to the buyers in the off-licence sector and in the on-trade. In the United States, as the Deputy is probably aware, there are a number of states which are state-controlled and even though the sale of alcoholic beverages in those states is controlled by the local or state government, they are significant purchasers of Irish alcoholic drinks. We have run several of those activities and have seen significant uplift in sales in states such as Ohio and Montana where we did an activity recently. We bring some of those buyers to Ireland to visit the distilleries and to understand the story of Irish whiskey. We have just finished an important trade show in which we had 19 exhibitions, I think, in Dusseldorf in Germany, called ProWein, which is the trade show for alcoholic beverages in Europe. From speaking to Drinks Industry Ireland, it is hugely valuable for them to be part of that particular trade show due to the importance of exhibiting and the buyers who attend. There is a similar US version of that happening shortly, in which we will be participating. There are several activities, if memory serves me right, in June and in August in other states. There is something planned in Texas for August. We use the summer period to attract some of those buyers to go on visits and to sustain and develop that export activity.