Pat Deering (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fine Gael)
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Question 749: To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine if he will provide an update on the possible return of a sugar industry to Ireland following on from the two feasibility studies prepared last year. [26811/12]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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The EU Sugar Regime underwent a radical reform in 2005 and Greencore, the holder of the entire Irish sugar quota availed of the sugar restructuring scheme, dismantled its facilities and ceased production in 2006. Post reform production is now concentrated in 18 Member States. The present regime runs from 1 September 2006 to the 30 September 2015. There is no mechanism under the present EU Regulations which would allow for the re-instatement of the sugar quota for the growing of sugar beet in Ireland for the production of sugar.

I have strongly supported the full abolition of sugar quotas from September 2015 as part of the CAP reform discussions which are currently underway in the Council of Ministers, and which, if agreed, would replace the existing quota regime. I also raised the issue with Commissioner Ciolos during his visit to Ireland in January 2012.

In 2011 I met with two separate groups who have conducted feasibility studies, into the possibility of establishing a sugar/bioethanol facility here. At both meetings, I stated that any venture to develop a combined sugar/bioethanol production facility would have to be a commercial proposition, financed in total by investors and interested parties and make sound economic sense in order to be viable. I also further suggested to both groups the desirability of there being only one single proposition in play, as both studies had indicated a potential for only one such viable project and both groups had appeared to accept the reasonableness of this position at the time.