Paul Daly (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister and thank him for his comprehensive statement. As Members are all aware, the agrifood sector supports 300,000 jobs in rural communities where they are most needed, and it is our largest indigenous industry, with food and drink exports reaching €12 billion in 2018. When we discuss progress on climate action, we have to be cognisant of these facts and always consider the sustainability of the industry in whatever measures are taken and need to be taken.Irish and EU food security concerns must be put on an equal footing with climate change responsibilities and the central role of an exporting country such as Ireland, which has a carbon-efficient food production sector. By 2050, agriculture will need to produce almost 50% more food than it did in 2012, according to the UN, to meet global food demand. Ireland's greenhouse gas emissions profile is unique within Europe, being heavily weighted towards agriculture due to the lack of heavy industry within our overall economy.

The inclusion of land use, land use change and forestry within the scope of the new EU 2030 climate change framework is a welcome development and represents a sensible approach, broadening the tools available to Ireland to reduce greenhouse gas emissions through carbon sequestration. This will enable Ireland access the removal of 26.8 million tonnes of CO2 emissions over the 2021 to 2030 period. While this inclusion is welcome, it can go much further. We need to get down to the nitty-gritty, if possible of eventually reaching the point of being able to have individual farm carbon footprint indicators. This may not be scientifically possible and may be an onerous task. There are 440,000 km of hedgerow which are maintained and form part of farm holdings but for which there are no carbon credits. As the Minister said, the farmers are the custodians of rural Ireland and of the environment. If we were to take into consideration all the good work they do, for example, on those hedgerows, scrubs, poor areas of land, wetlands and small areas of forestation, along with our official forests, for want of a better term, there is a possibility and at least the potential to reach carbon neutrality on many farms if we get credit as farmers for the good work we do, heretofore unrecognised.

For 2017, total Irish greenhouse gas emissions across all sectors are estimated to be 0.9% lower than emissions in 2016. Agriculture, however, remains the largest contributor to overall emissions, at 33% of the total, with the transport and energy industries the next largest contributors, each at 20%. Agriculture emissions increased by just under 3% in 2017, which reflects the expansion of the dairy herd post quotas and the national policy to expand the sector under Food Harvest 2020 and Food Wise 2025. While dairy cow numbers increased by 3% in the year to 2017, this was in the context of milk production increasing by 9% over the 12 month period. This is another indicator of the work being done. To coin an old phrase, there is a lot done but a hell of a lot more needs to be done.

Nitrogen fertiliser is the major issue. Its use increased by 8.8% in 2017. Soil fertility and the use of fertilisers such as nitrogen need to be looked at seriously and incorporated in any future schemes, be it the Common Agricultural Policy, CAP, or whatever else, with a view to improving our greenhouse gas emissions.

Sometimes we can learn more about the future by looking at the past. It is a proven fact that between 1990 and 2017, agricultural emissions in Ireland decreased by 0.7% while production increased by 40%. I know that the figures and the extent of the increase in numbers have probably changed since that period, but this just goes to show that because of the rural environment protection scheme, REPS, and similar schemes, we were able to increase production while reducing emissions. We could learn lessons from the past, and it is no harm at times to look back to schemes that have worked when we devise schemes for the future. During the period when agricultural emissions decreased by 7%, transport sector emissions increased by 133% and energy sector emissions increased by 118%.

It is not that Irish agriculture's output is high-polluting. In fact, Ireland is one of the most highly intensive, lowest carbon food producers in the world. The carbon footprint per kilogram of output of Irish farms is one of the lowest globally. According to the Joint Research Centre of the European Commission, Irish dairying is the most efficient CO2 per kilogram of milk in the EU, while Irish beef production is the fifth most efficient CO2 per kilogram of beef. It is essential that EU emissions targets are balanced with sustainable food output. Otherwise, there is the risk that they could become self-defeating, leading to a transfer of food production, also known as carbon leakage, to other countries which have lower overall costs but less carbon-efficient production methods. This argument has been made by the agriculture sector and the political sector at times but is not being accepted in many circles. However, it is factual. The climate action that is needed is needed globally. While we might solve all our problems in Ireland by reducing production and ticking all the boxes, we are only one small island in the global picture, the beef we are so efficiently producing would then be replaced by production in places such as Brazil with a carbon footprint four times ours, and it still would not change the rate of global climate change.

Many CAP and rural development schemes have requirements which incentivise and require environmentally beneficial farming practices and the reduction of our carbon footprint. These include greening measures; the green low-carbon agri-environment scheme, GLAS, which has 50,000 farmers participating; and the beef data and genomics programme, which is genotyping up to 1 million cattle to improve the carbon footprint in the suckler herd. Ireland's Rural Development Programme 2014-2020 is providing support for climate change adaptation and mitigation actions, with 85% of total measures in this area. Much more action is needed, however, together with the adoption of new technologies to reduce the carbon footprint further, and the provision of further incentives to meet targets in the next CAP to accelerate the delivery of greenhouse gas reduction in farming practices.

Irrespective of the headline of the topic of debate we will have when it comes to agriculture, it will eventually always come back to the sustainability of farming as a whole, the commodity prices and the farmer's income. As the Minister quite rightly said, farmers are the custodians of the environment. They are very conscious of the role they play and can play and the improvements they can make in this area. It is very hard, however, to get anyone to do anything when he or she does not have the hard cash to do it. When farmers are struggling because of their margins to put food on their family tables and to educate their children, the improvements they need to make to their efficiency will be way down their list of priorities, because by the time they get to those improvements, they will not have any money left. Therefore, while it would not be a fix-all solution, it would certainly set the train of thought, the attitude and the ambition of the farming community in the right direction if we could get them a fair price for their commodity and if they had some disposable income at the end of the day to invest in the technologies, the processes and the methods they need to adopt to improve the situation.