Paraic Brady (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I am sharing two minutes with Senator Duffy.

Ireland’s CAP strategic plan, CSP, for 2023 to 2027, underpins the sustainable development of Ireland's farming and food sector. Food production is a must to feed a growing population. Ireland has the best ecological system to produce a green, grass-fed beef, lamb, dairy and vegetable sector. It goes without saying that our product is sought all over globally.

Regarding the CAP itself, I am glad the Minister mentioned simplification. I will go through it for those who do not understand the CAP system. With the green agenda, people have signed into ACRES. We have seen late payments on that scheme to date although many farmers depend on the payments system. The Minister has addressed that and we are in the process of bringing that number below 10,000. I congratulate him on that but it is something that needs to be rectified going into the future.

Environmental climate training, eco schemes and the EU LIFE programme are a few of the initiatives under way. We have the climate scheme, ACRES, the areas of natural constraint, ANC, payment; the knowledge transfer programme; the national dairy beef welfare scheme, as the Minister mentioned; the protein aid scheme; sheep welfare measures and suckler carbon efficiency measures. These are all parts of CAP. On farm viability, there is the basic income support for sustainability scheme, BISS, and the complementary redistributive income support for sustainability, CRISS. We have the young farmer capital investment scheme, YFCIS, which is on the TAMS end of it.

The whole thing is broken down into bits of schemes where there should be simplification. Farmers have bought into ACRES; we are oversubscribed for that scheme. Farmers are best-placed to know how their land works. They have a growing knowledge, which has been handed down from generation to generation. They have bought into the schemes. We know how farmers work; they do what they do best, which is to farm and produce food, such as vegetables, beef and milk. To farm at this moment in time when we have all these schemes, a person would want to be an accountant and have a degree in bookkeeping as well as in filling out forms. The whole sector is now top-heavy in paperwork. Unless you have a farm adviser or are paying somebody, these schemes are mind boggling to say the least. What I am asking for is that in the new scheme, we have simplification and let farmers go back to what they do best, that is, to produce food.

Ireland has the best ecological system in the world to produce a product that is sought after and that we export much of. Why not encourage farmers in this country to do what we are good at, which is to produce food, feed the growing population of the world and try to sell our product? Our product has never been more expensive than at this time because it is so sought after. I thank the Minister for his time.