Minister of State at the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (Senator Pippa Hackett):

I thank the Deputy and agree with him. We have a sense of what we know we should be doing. On the data piece, I agree that we could wait forever for exact data, and it is continually evolving anyway in some regards. Even recently, data from Teagasc last year showed that we have overestimated some of the figures regarding emissions from organic soils and that some of the soils are in fact wetter than we had given them credit for. In one sense, there is a comfort there in that farmers have been able to farm on those lands. I know there are fears with regard to what any sort of rewetting proposals might look like. It is important we communicate that there are opportunities here to continue farming, maybe in a less intensive way, on certain lands.

I agree with the sentiments that we should just do our best effort to engage on this. I suppose we are through some of the schemes we have out there already. I think there is already engagement from farmers in measures that support not only carbon in soils but the wider biodiversity piece, and that is to be welcomed.

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