Mr. Kieran McEvoy:

We have got to where we are through no fault of the Irish tillage farmer. It is through the rising cost of doing business in this country. Fertiliser, chemicals and farm machinery prices have doubled. Inputs on crops have gone up 106% alone. The best case scenario this year is that tillage farmers will break even on their own land and some people on rented land could lose up to €600 a hectare. That is how morale has gone so low.

How did we get here? The world has got reliant on cheap grain and other parts of the world have moved on with technology, such as genetically modified grains. They also have access to cheaper chemicals and fertilisers as well as labour. To answer the Deputy's question, nothing has probably gone wrong with the tillage farmer in this country. They are still some of the best in the world but we have been left behind. We are pitched against a very different world stage. As the national grain chairman of IFA, I have never seen the morale so low in an industry that is producing a fantastic product for this country and doing a service for our drinks, feed and grain industries. We are the lowest carbon sector in Ireland, which will be proved, and probably in the world at growing grain, so it is a really pity.