EPA - Ireland's Environment 2016 - An Assessment

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Key High-level Messages References
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Exchange (KE) in the Irish Agri-Food Sector using Expert
Opinion. EPA, Wexford, Ireland. Available online:
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CSO (Central Statistics Office), 2015. Farm Structures
Survey 2013. Available online:
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CSO (Central Statistics Office), 2015 and 2016.
Agricultural Statistics downloaded from StatBank in June
2016, CSO, Dublin.
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Minister for Finance and the Minister for Agriculture, Food
and the Marine, October 2014. DAFM, Dublin.
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Chapter 12: Environment and Agriculture
Ireland’s environment plays a vital role in the
quality of Ireland’s agricultural produce and
productivity. Recognising local and regional
contraints and valuing the range of ecosystems
service that agicultural land provides will be
key to ensuring a balanced approach to the
future development of Irish agriculture and
rural communities.
Environmentally sustainable intensification of
the agriculture sector will depend on a strong,
reliable evidence base upon which all
stakeholders involved in environmental
protection and agriculture development and
management can depend.
Adapting to and mitigating the impacts of
climate change will be a key challenge for the
Irish agricultural sector and the challenge of
achieving GHG neutrality within the
agriculture and land use sectors is profound.
Water pollution caused by the loss of
nutrients and the loss of pesticides to waters
from agricultural land are major concerns
that need to addressed collectively by all
environmental and agricultural stakeholders.
Building trust between environmental and
agricultural stakeholders is a major challenge
that will need to be addressed to achieve
meaningful engagement on achieving
economic competitiveness and
environmental sustainability.