Conference on Agri-Food

I had an excellent day yesterday speaking at the Cork County Mayor's Conference on the Agri-Food Sector in the Cork Region at the Trident Hotel in Kinsale. It was great to share a platform with Professor Pat Wall from UCD, Professor Alan Reilly from the FSAI, the County Manager Martin Riordan along with some amazing food business people.

The event was chaired by the Cork County Mayor Mr Tim Lombard. Pat O'Connell from Kay O'Connell's Fish Merchants gave an impassioned speech about the importance of supporting small local food businesses. Peter Ward from County Choice gave an excellent talk on the significance and potential of the Irish middle farm and developing food and agri tourism in support of on farm business. Ger Power of Cork County Council, along with the County Manager, outlined some really encouraging supports that Cork County Council is providing to food business. Kevin O'Gorman of Irish Distillers gave us an insight into the success story that is that company, which is an extraordinary good news story for East Cork.

Colette Twomey told us how the Clonakilty Blackpudding brand came from small beginnings to the major international brand that it now is. And John O'Brien brought us from Barryroe Co-op's first creamery manager who was a 26 year old veteran of the Civil War to the phenomenally successful international food ingredients business that is Carbery Milk Products today. Overall, it was a really thought provoking conference.

The big thing that I took away from the day was the importance of integrating tourism with food. This has so much potential, Peter Ward talked about visiting vineyards in California; they're just farms after all, we've got those in abundance combined with some of the greatest scenery in the world. The topic I chose for the day was Exporting Know How: Opportunity is Ireland's Regulatory Opportunity.

The text of my presentation is linked here.

-- Flor McCarthy