Written answers

Thursday, 10 July 2008

Department of Agriculture and Food

Marine Biotechnology Initiative

4:00 pm

Photo of Michael CreedMichael Creed (Cork North West, Fine Gael)
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Question 564: To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food the progress made in relation to the programme for Government proposal to instigate a national marine biotechnology initiative to make Ireland a world leader in this important sector; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [28619/08]

Photo of Brendan SmithBrendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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The MI is leading and co-ordinating the initiation of a complex programme in Biodiscovery, which seeks to utilise Ireland's marine biodiversity for the discovery of novel compounds for use in drug discovery, biomaterials and biomedical engineering. This involves the coordination of existing, and the initiation of new, research across a wide range of third-level, agency and industry groups. Initial funding of €7million for the establishment of research personnel has been committed under the Beaufort scheme and PhD research fellowships have been funded by the MI through IRCSET. A recruitment process, for a world-class researcher to be located in NUIG, is underway for the Principal Investigator who will lead this research programme.

A €5.2 million Marine Functional Foods Research Initiative, aimed at establishing Ireland as a leader in the $74 billion worldwide market for functional foods was announced 24th April 2007 by the then Ministers for Marine Communications and Natural Resources and for Agriculture and Food in Dublin. A research consortium led by Teagasc and including UCD, NUIG, UL, UCC and the University of Ulster, Coleraine was invited to prepare a detailed work programme that targeted the identification and extraction of functional materials form algae, fish processing waste, underutilised and abundant species and aquaculture products following an international expert review of their application. After negotiations between the MI and the consortium, a contract was signed in December 2007. The consortium commenced a search process to identify two international professorial level researchers, (one to be based at UCC and the other at UCD) with specific expertise in marine functional ingredients; the recruitment of post-doctoral (7) and PhD students (7) was also initiated. The programme's management board, chaired by Dr Noel Cawley will hold its first meeting on 14th July, 2008.

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