Mr. Breian Carroll:

I will answer the other questions. It must be acknowledged that, for the first time ever for our association, the Department and Minister have funded organic specialists. We also received support for an agri-environmental specialist before Christmas. This has been successful and is bringing links with other State agencies and within our own network to members on the ground and on to farmers, mirroring what is in the public sector, albeit at a smaller scale for the time being.

We have no figures on what the Deputy asked about, but we intend to make a submission on the matter soon. We will probably need two specialists – one to cover each half of the country – as a start. They could be incorporated into some of the objectives and programmes, be the association’s representatives in those important forums and bring information back to our network and out to farmers. A link needs to be found.

We have also sought some level of support for our office to act as a conduit to farmers. I will provide an example. Currently, our association is run by me and two others working part-time, but our network covers 55,000 farmers and 210 members. All we are asking for is a bit of support. In fairness to the Government, that has happened and has been successful. Given the topic under discussion, though, it is important that everyone in the sector get this correct. The Government would be pushing on an open door by supporting our association in getting the message out to our members and farmers.