Paul Daly (Fianna Fail)
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I thank the representatives of Macra na Feirme for attending. As I said in the previous session, I thank the committee for coming up with this initiative. This is the first meeting in a process where this committee will formulate a document with an argument, making as strong a case as possible through our meetings and investigations to try to ensure we maintain the derogation. It is vital. Everyone who is in any way involved in the sector and who will be in any way affected needs to sing from the same hymn sheet.

With that in mind, I will ask the same questions I asked the groups at the previous session, because we are trying to gather information and the opinions of all the different actors involved. I asked three questions. The witnesses received the six questions and they will come out in the course of our discussion. The implications for Ireland if we lose this are that it will not only affect farmers, or dairy farmers - many people think this is a dairy farmer issue - it has serious implications for all the other sectors. We went through those in the earlier session. We will not go over them again. The processing, Ireland Inc., the industry, the jobs and the amount of investment that has been put into stainless steel and so on will suffer if we do not have milk. It is important that everyone present is fighting the same battle and, as Deputy Fitzmaurice said earlier, that we are all pushing the car up the hill and no one is sitting on the bonnet. Perhaps we will get the car up the hill.

I would like the witnesses to comment on three areas. First, the narrative is often put out that the derogation gives us an unfair advantage over our European counterparts and, at the end of the day, those 26 countries will decide whether we get an extension or a new derogation in 2025. The witnesses have a lot of dealings with their cohorts, peers and affiliate groups in Europe. They might comment on how the Irish derogation is perceived by them and on what role we can play in influencing the political classes or the farm representative bodies in Europe that may, if that narrative is correct, put up barriers to us getting the derogation going forward for the reasons given. They might perceive it as Ireland getting an unfair advantage.

The second matter I raised with the other witnesses was anaerobic digestion and the role it might play. We are 20 years behind the curve on this. I would like to hear the witnesses' comments on that. We had a lot of discussion in the earlier session about targeted agriculture modernisation schemes, TAMS, and grants, the need for more slurry storage and for slurry to go out at the right time of year. Is there a role for anaerobic digestion? We know what stage we should be at. How can we expedite the conversation? If I could export slurry to another anaerobic digester in the morning, albeit with dry facilities needed, then I could take back my slurry in dry matter form, store it in a hay shed and use it when growth is at its maximum. Then I would get the maximum benefit from it. It is a no-brainer that it must be part of the solution, but how can we expedite the process where it may play a role? Perhaps I am outside things and it does not have a big role to play going forward.

The third matter I would like the witnesses to comment on is a programme they are probably familiar with. It is the wastewater quality project Tirlán initiated and led in the River Slaney catchment area in conjunction with the local authority waters programme, LAWPRO, Wexford, Carlow and Wicklow County Councils and Teagasc. I would like to hear the witnesses' comments on that initiative, that type of initiative and what role they see for processors and industry. As I said earlier, they have as much at stake and to lose in this. What role can they play? If this goes south, they will potentially be the biggest losers. There is a role for industry in a collaborative effort to try to be seen at least to make every effort to improve water quality. I welcome the initiative by Tírlán, but is there potential for more to be done on the industry side?