Joe O'Reilly (Fine Gael)
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I thank the Chair. I welcome their excellencies. I wish them all a happy Africa day. There have been tremendous bonds between Ireland and Africa going back to my childhood. There was much interest in Africa because of the large number of Irish missionaries who went to Africa. Apart from the great idealistic work they were doing and the energy they brought with them, it also created back here an interest in and an awareness of Africa and a fondness or bond that would not have existed otherwise and that continues.

On the area of agriculture, I am very aware that the former director of Teagasc, Professor Gerry Boyle, who is known to the Chair, did initiate a number of links with Africa in terms of agriculture through co-operation between Teagasc and agricultural development work in Africa. The Chair might know more about this. Some of it was centred in Gambia, but it was centred in a number of countries in Africa and Professor Boyle did some great work in that area as director of Teagasc.

I wish to raise a few things as quickly as I can. First, on Gaza, it would be interesting to hear a few of the witnesses' views on how, after the horrific war and genocide that is in progress at the moment, they might see Gaza? What do they see as a positive construct there or can they see anything positive? How would they see Gaza, as an entity, emerge from this in terms of an administration and life there? I would like to hear from the neighbouring countries in particular. Our Egyptian colleague might have something to say about that. Any of the ambassadors may have something interesting to say on how Gaza and the whole territories there would evolve from this war situation. What sort of structures will exist? What role would neighbouring countries play there? That may be interesting.

On migration, as the witnesses are diplomatic personnel, they are quite aware, because they keep themselves well briefed, that migration is emerging as a bit of a political issue in this country. That begs the question as to what can be done in the countries that are the sources of migration to create infrastructure and a society where migration is not necessary and on how Europe can contribute to that and how we in Europe could influence that. It may be interesting to get a comment on that. That obviously relates to the level of trade and green energy. The Algerian ambassador elucidated the great lack of development of trade, business and industry within Africa relative to the rest of the world. That does offer the potential to create green energy and a whole green industry now that they are beginning from scratch, in many instances. I am interested in that.

I ask the Sudanese ambassador specifically what is being done to protect civilians from the horrors of the fighting and what supports are hoped for in protecting them in terms of peacekeeping and so on. We sympathise and empathise as it is very distressing to hear of the fighting in Sudan. It depresses all of us listening to the news in the morning to hear that.

On South Africa, I ask Her Excellency about energy, blackouts and that kind of thing. Are they are co-operating with the ESB in Ireland? What areas of co-operation might be established to deal with energy issues in South Africa? Is there potential to work alongside the ESB? To what extent has that been exploited?

To finish, as a general thesis, there are a number of things. We have to work together to create the conditions in Africa where migration would be like the way it is currently in Ireland, thankfully. It is a matter of choice whether one leaves Ireland at the moment. We need that to be the case all over the world, that people leave their homeland by choice, rather than being forced out. It is incumbent on the rest of the world to create conditions where people will not be forced out. The whole green energy area is interesting. I thank the Chair for the opportunity to speak.