Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Michael Creed has said that competitiveness, Brexit preparedness and human capital are key to the themes of Food Waste 2025.
Minister Creed chaired the 16th meeting of the Food Wise 2025 High-Level Implementation Committee (HLIC), where Brexit, Competitiveness and the “People in Dairy Action Plan” were discussed.
Two years on from the Brexit vote, the Department of Agriculture has continued to work to mitigate the possible impacts of Brexit, in particular devising a contingency plan and sharpening its focus on being sufficiently prepared.
Creed and his department are also continuing a series of bilateral engagements with EU counterparts on Brexit.
Preparing For The Worst
Minister Creed stated, “My Department is engaging fully with industry stakeholders to ensure that everybody is fully sighted on the Brexit issues. We will continue with this dialogue as the negotiations proceed”.
Regarding the competitiveness of the Irish agri-food sector, Creed said, My Department continues to engage with stakeholders to address competitiveness challenges at farm and processing level, particularly through the Food Wise implementation process.
“Competitiveness is one of the key themes of the Food Wise strategy, with detailed recommendations aimed at building on Ireland's comparative advantages in terms of our sustainable, grass-fed production system, our positive business environment, and our reputation in science-based innovation and product development”.
Minister Creed established a multi-stakeholder industry group last autumn to consider labour and human capital issues facing the dairy sector.
The group, which was convened under the chairmanship of former Secretary General of the Department Tom Moran, prepared the ‘People in Dairy Action Plan’ and this was presented to the Food Wise High-Level Implementation Committee today.
Minister Creed concluded that “This Action Plan is a key output from Food Wise 2025, it is appropriate that it is forward-looking and visionary. I commend the Chairman and the industry stakeholder group on this excellent piece of work”.
Creed recently met with his UK counterpart, Michael Gove MP, Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs in London at the UK Food and Drinks Federation (FDF) Conference, where they discussed a number of issues concerning Brexit, including matters relating to the agri-food and fisheries sector, and the equine sector
© 2018 Checkout – your source for the latest Irish retail news. Article by Aidan O’Sullivan. Click subscribe to sign up for the Checkout print edition.
