Ms Geraldine O'Sullivan:

I thank the Senator for the questions. As the conversation goes on, there are two things going on in parallel here, the carbon conversation and the nature and biodiversity conversation. They are related but very different. The nature restoration law deals with biodiversity and with addressing and improving the restoration status within it. Then there is the dual benefit of climate. That comes back to the ACRES. It is designed from a biodiviersity and nature-based perspective. It has the added benefit in respect of carbon, of course, because if we improve the health and well-being of our nature, that will have an improvement in respect of carbon as well. I just wanted to clarify that as the conversation goes on.

Farmers in schemes are looking at rewetting and going into it with the EIP. We are looking at the practicalities of it, measuring within Teagasc the carbon fluxes and what exactly is being sequestered. We are gathering those data. If carbon markets are a little more evolved, and if the market gives a value to that, we could see the potential there and could see that taking over. It is, however, very much an economic decision for the farmer. There will be those who will look at it and see the potential of it. We are lucky that Bord na Móna is doing work as well, and that can feed into the process. We are very much at those early stages. I do not think anybody is concerned about the impacts on other land. We are gathering those data so we are in that process. We are looking at this and we have to look at it as a phased approach.

As for restoration and what exactly it means, reduced intensity, the economic impact of that and the nature benefits and the carbon benefits of it have to be looked at. Mr. O'Brien made a very important point earlier about bringing the message back to the farmer. We have a programme on water called agricultural sustainability support and advisory programme, ASSAP. That is working collaboratively and locally. There was a comment earlier - I think Ms O'Neill made it - about being catchment-based. We are locally based. There will be locally based solutions, looking at programmes like ASSAP and putting them within nature and climate. There is potential there to work collaboratively with farmers to identify areas on the farm. It is very much a collaborative process.

I will pass on to Mr. Buckley.