Timmy Dooley (Clare, Fianna Fail)
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484. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine if he will provide a timeline for the development of his Department's specific climate change targets; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [49560/18]

Michael Creed (Cork North West, Fine Gael)
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My Department is actively engaged as part of the whole of Government approach to transitioning to a low-carbon, competitive, sustainable and climate resilient economy and society. This transition approach is not based on sectoral specific targets: rather, each sector is engaging in a process to identify and implement climate mitigation policy measures and action to meet the 2020 and 2030 climate targets.

A key part of this process has been the development of the National Mitigation Plan (NMP) which my Department contributed a series of mitigation actions and measures for the agriculture and land use sector including forestry . These measures not only focus on the mitigation of greenhouse gases and improving resource efficiency but are also aimed at restoring, preserving and enhancing ecosystems related to building resilience of agricultural production systems (i.e. adaptation).

My Department, along with other government departments, provides quarterly progress reports to the Department of Communications, Climate Action and Energy, who are the lead department in this respect. As part of the on-going review, a number of additional measures and actions are developed by my Department for the sector. By way of example, the most recently announced new measures include: Forestry Knowledge Transfer Groups ( sharing best practices in the forest sector), the Woodland Environment Fund (providing access to additional incentives for native woodland planting) and the Beef Environmental Efficiency Pilot. - This builds on the success of the Beef Data and Genomics Programme (measure AF2A in NMP) and is a new pilot scheme targeted at efficiency improvements for suckler farmers.

Whilst the mitigation potential for Agriculture is indeed limited, Agriculture can and must play a key role in contributing to Ireland's climate change and energy targets in the year ahead.