Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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78. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the extent to which employment will increase throughout the agrifood sector over the next five years; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [2686/16]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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The CSO’s recently published Quarterly National Household Survey (Quarter 3 2015) showed that employment in the agri-food sector overall, and in its component parts, has reached 169,000. Based on this data, this sector represents circa 8.5% of national employment. The CSO figures are based on sample surveys. Food Wise 2025, the new ten year strategy for the agri-food sector published in July 2015, builds on the successful vision of Food Harvest 2020. It identifies the opportunities and challenges facing the sector and provides an enabling strategy that will allow the sector to grow and prosper. Food Wise includes more than 400 specific recommendations, spread across the cross-cutting themes of sustainability, innovation, human capital, market development and competitiveness; as well as specific sectoral recommendations. Food Wise identifies ambitious and challenging growth projections for the industry over the next ten years, including an 85% increase in exports to €19 billion and the creation of 23,000 additional jobs all along the supply chain by 2025.