Colm Burke (Cork North Central, Fine Gael)
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844. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine if consideration will be given to the establishment of a Border inspection point in the Port of Cork in order that goods with an origin outside of the European community can be inspected in Cork which are currently required to be transported to Dublin Port to be inspected; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [23290/22]

Charlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail)
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I wish to advise the Deputy that Cork Port is currently a designated border control post for container shipments of wood and wood products. Inspections of these products take place at the Tivoli Container Terminal near Cork City. However, it should be noted that the physical infrastructure required for handling bulk wood products and that required for handling food products, are very different.

The Port of Cork is currently developing new facilities at Ringaskiddy. Between 2015 and 2018, a number of meetings took place between my Department and the Port of Cork. In December 2018, the Port authority advised that they did not intend to pursue the building of a border control post at that time and they would consider that as a second phase of their development. They have since submitted a business case for the building of a border control post, capable of handling food products.

As a border control post may only be located in a customs-controlled area, this business case can only be considered in the context of Revenue designating any place where it is proposed that a border control post will be built, as a customs-controlled area.

In recent years, the focus of my Department has been on ensuring sufficient border control post infrastructure was available to deal with sanitary and phytosanitary goods being imported, into the European Union Single Market from Great Britain, following the Brexit Referendum. This involved a very substantial expansion of border control post infrastructure at Dublin Port, as well as the building of an interim facility at Rosslare Port. Work on plans for the building of a permanent facility in Rosslare Europort has recently been completed.

The issue of whether an additional border control post might be required in Port of Cork remains under consideration and officials from my Department continue to analyse the requirements for this facility.