Michael Creed (Cork North West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I do not mean to undermine Deputy Wallace's bona fides in respect of livestock; I think he has done that himself. He is singing the praises of the tillage sector. We need all of the sectors but we need balance in the debate as well. The Deputy should make himself a little better informed about carbon sequestration in the tillage sector. We need balance in the debate. We are committed in the agriculture sector and in my Department to reducing the carbon footprint further. The net point is that we have done a lot but we have some considerable distance to go. It would be foolish to hang us out on the altar of climate change and have the required food production outsourced to countries that have far larger carbon footprints. That would be illogical in the extreme. While we have more to do across all the sectors, including dairy, beef, tillage and forestry, we have travelled some considerable distance, something for which we never get any credit.

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