Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Sinn Fein)
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546. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine if he is satisfied with the level of data that is collected on the issues which come under his Department's remit; the steps he will take to work with the administration in Northern Ireland to collect data under his aegis on a North-South basis; and the budgets he will put in place to undertake this work (details supplied). [14434/16]

Michael Creed (Cork North West, Fine Gael)
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Under the Good Friday Agreement the agreed areas of co-operation for Agriculture are (i) the development of an all-Island Animal Health Strategy for control of movements and the prevention, containment and eradication of epizootic diseases in Ireland, (ii) the development of an all-Island Plant Health and Research Strategy including co-operation between both jurisdictions in relation to plant protection products, and (iii) liaison on issues arising at WTO, EU enlargement and the mid-term review of the CAP.

Officials from my Department liaise closely with their counterparts in the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, Northern Ireland, on these areas of co-operation including in relation to data sharing. As Minister I will attend the North/South Ministerial sectoral meetings and I will also be attending the Plenary meetings which are attended by the Taoiseach and the Head of the Northern Ireland Executive. Both the sectoral and plenary meetings usually take place bi-annually.

Apart from the agreed areas of co-operation both sides use the opportunity to discuss other areas of mutual concern/interest. For example the issue of farm safety is of huge importance to both jurisdictions and one where there is on-going significant sharing of information with a view to reducing the incidence of injury and fatalities on farms. In this regard a North/South Farm Safety Group (NSFSG) was established and it was agreed that as well as meeting bi-annually to discuss areas of collaboration and to develop joint initiatives to increase farm safety awareness, there was agreement to share intelligence on farm safety such as research material and grant scheme development specifications. In addition a very successful All Island Farm Safety Conference took place in November 2015 which was jointly hosted by the Irish Health and Safety Authority and the Health and Safety Executive Northern Ireland.