Kevin Humphreys (Dublin South East, Labour)

I thank the Ceann Comhairle for selecting the issue and I thank the Minister of State for taking the question. Despite the excellent growth and export figures for the food industry, there has been an alarming trend in recent years whereby several key food manufacturing centres have closed down. This trend has serious consequences for food security. We are an island nation but despite our access to European markets and strong transport links to Europe, the volcanic ash cloud incident and the ice and snow last winter showed us that it is not difficult to shut down these links for a period.

On 19 January, it was announced that the Odlums industrial-sized flour mill on Alexandra Road would be closed by the parent company, Valeo Foods. My sympathies go to the workers and their families. Many of these families had worked for several generations in the flour milling industry.

This is the last remaining industrial bread flour mill in the State since the Odlums Cork mill closed in 2009. Bolands Mills and Dock Milling have closed as has the mill in Portlaoise and several other mills throughout the country. We are left with a single mill. The mill in Dublin Port has been in operation since 1920, producing 17,000 tonnes of flour annually. From the end of March most bread in Ireland will be made from imported flour. This is a serious issue for bread makers and consumers. It reduces their choice and has a possible implication for pricing. For many years the flour industry has suffered from dumping of over-produced flour, especially from the British market, making some of our flour mills uneconomical. The costs may not become clear for years but we have seen in the case of Irish Sugar that losing these strategic industries results in a loss of skills that cannot be replaced easily. A similar problem occurred in the case of SR Technics. These skills have been developed over many decades and we are now facing the closure of the final remaining mill. For a country that places such pride in its food, it is bizarre that we will now be reliant on flour from the United Kingdom for most of our bread which is a key part of almost every Irish person's diet.

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