Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The Deputy makes a fair point. There is a concern that when money is invested in processing equipment, the resulting modernisation and mechanisation can reduce the number of people working in the factories concerned. We are trying to ensure that we are competitive as a place to land, process and add value to fish. For example, the landing of blue whiting in Killybegs last year was a significant injection into the local economy. We hope this will continue during 2013 but we also need to find a way of ensuring that instead of simply sending fish landed in Ireland elsewhere in frozen or chilled form for grading and processing, we do that work here. We have the infrastructure and expertise to do the work but we need to continue investing to add value and export higher value products. That is where the jobs will be created. Killybegs clearly could be at the centre of such activities because of its scale and size. This is why the emphasis of the grant has slightly changed to 30% for added value and 20% for general processing upgrades in order to encourage people down the route of added value.

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