Mr. Richard Donnelly:

The Deputy alluded to the mackerel in the past and how it was not valued. This is one of the primary things we are trying to do, which is to maximise the value on the return. We have a number of initiatives. The first thing is linking in with other agencies. We are working very closely with Teagasc and the BIA Innovator Campus in Athenry, and Ms Bocquel mentioned earlier the access to co-product utilisation, to maximise the value of all the fish that is landed, and not necessarily have it going to fishmeal, as the Deputy mentioned a couple of times. We want to get as much return as possible. An example of this is for the first time ever we were able to get mackerel fillets to a standard and export them to the standard that Japan required. The exports went out in 2024, the first time that Ireland has directly exported mackerel fillets. This is due to the new technology investments in some of the Killybegs processors up there. We have also developed with market visits to see state-of-the-art technologies. We have already been to Finland to see a company called SuperGround. There is investment in technology there that has been brought back to Killybegs to maximise all the heads, the tails and the other parts of the fish. It is a primary concern to try to maximise everything that is landed.