Mr. Joe Healy:

Absolutely, but we need a media to accept what the Chairman says. We saw the amount of coverage given to the Citizens' Assembly, for example, at which the arguments put were, at the very best, biased and it was almost considered that its recommendations should be incorporated into law straight away. We saw one national paper refer sometime last year to the suckler cow as akin to a weapon of mass destruction. When we have this kind of hysteria, it is more difficult to sell the message. Agriculture has a very good message. How often have members seen any of the mainstream media highlight the fact that we are the most efficient producer of dairy product in Europe? If they did not hear it from the farm organisations, they would have to go searching for it and this is the problem. We need the media to be fair-minded and willing to take the two sides. In addition, certain biased sectors or organisations talk about the 33% of emissions in Ireland for which agriculture is responsible. It has been mentioned already that climate change is not just an Irish issue but a global issue, yet those who proclaim to be experts in the field of climate change talk about reducing the dairy herd or suckler cow numbers. We have a growing population. These people know that this growing population must be fed. In the next 25 years we expect it to grow from 7 billion to 9 billion. This population will have to be fed. There is a growing middle class that will be in the market for protein products - for example, dairy and beef - but some of our own people still say we should reduce dairy and beef production, even though we are among the top producers in the world from a carbon footprint point of view. It is a paradox in a way. It behoves us as farm organisations to try to keep getting that message out there but a little more help from the media would be welcome.