Mr. Billy Cronin:

Sustainability is a key component of Dairygold. We have a team of six sustainability advisers dotted around different catchment areas in counties Cork, Tipperary and Limerick. They meet farmers daily. We have a water quality programme. We introduced grassroots in 2023. This is a bonus system that will help farmers to drive action on farms. One of the key components of that is water quality. I sign up to my grassroots bonus system and get a 0.75 cent per litre equivalent, which is worth €4,200 per farm on average for each Dairygold farmer.

The first component of that is water quality. Farmers open their farms for water quality visits. The sustainability adviser goes to identify what needs to be done for nutrient management, farmyard management and land management, and creates four or five key actions for the farmer to implement. That is the first thing. It relates to the ecosystem, along with fertiliser and slurry storage. There is then herd and herd management, and recording herd health. It comes back to the farmer at the end of the day. The farmer is key to all of this. Without the farmer, nothing gets done. It is important that the farmer is educated and has the tools in the toolbox to ask the right question. Farmers are being informed and communicated with about what needs to be done.

We have a joint programme with Teagasc for peer-to-peer learning. We have ten demonstration farms across the Dairygold catchment area, showcasing the development of the science, trusting the science and implementing low emissions slurry, the nutrient management plan, using less fertiliser, growing grass and introducing clover to reduce nutrients. That is peer-to-peer learning. Farmers learn from each other, which is a key.

As Senator Lombard said, we have an event near his constituency on Friday at Raymond Goggin's farm in Templemartin. That will showcase what Raymond is doing for water quality, whether the buffer strips, yard management, slurry storage or so on. People will see the science behind what Dairygold is doing. Teagasc is supporting it too.