The combined industries of agri-food and tourism and hospitality are more important than foreign direct investment (FDI) in terms of sustainability, according to Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment, Simon Coveney.
He was speaking this week at the Good Food Ireland Awards held at The K Club in Co. Kildare.
He said that agri-food is an industry and a sector that should be celebrated on an annual basis.
Speaking to the audience, he said: “We all know what the challenges are and we all know what the questions that are being posed in terms of the food sector in the future [are]; how we continue to sustain this extraordinary growth story that last year was responsible for an export value of almost €17 billion in terms of food and drink.
“These are extraordinary drivers for indigenous sustainable growth in terms of the Irish economy.
“But it’s not just about growth and wealth creation, food and hospitality are about much more than that, because they are about creating in a person’s mind’s eye, when they think about Ireland, an image and a feeling that results in them seeing Ireland through a certain lens,” the minister added.
Agri-food sector
Minister Coveney explained that in Ireland, there are about 180,000 employees linked to the food sector, across a broad spectrum of different skillsets and there are a further 250,000 employed in hospitality and tourism.
“If you combine the two together, and there is some crossover, you are talking about somewhere between 15% and 18% of all employment in Ireland,” Coveney stated.
“Much more importantly than that, the actual regional spread of those jobs, not only in every county, but in every rural and urban parish in the country.
“That’s why this sector, these sectors together, are the most important drivers in the Irish economy, much more important than FDI, actually, in terms of sustainability and permanance.
“We need to be celebrating and enhancing that and constantly asking ourselves the question – can we do it better?” he added.
The former agriculture minister said the agri-food and tourism industries must keep sustainability as a priority and strive to deliver sustainability “at a pace that is necessary”.
“Likewise in terms of nutrition and added value and taste and tradition. Really what we need to be about is smart green growth, where we look at innovation, where we look at sustainability and we look at tradition, and we try to merge all of that into constant improvement all the time,” the minister continued.
“Industries need leaders and trailblazers to show how it can be done better and differently. How it can be sustainable, not only from an ecosystem and nature perspective, but also from an economic perspective. Because without both, it doesn’t happen.
“I’ve seen how others see Ireland from afar. We saw it last week with the visit of the most powerful person in the world to Ireland [US president, Joe Biden], when he described Ireland as a ‘thousand shades of green’.
“Not just in a traditional sense anymore, but also now in terms of green technology, green energy creation, sustainability and green food production,” Coveney explained.
The enterprise minister acknowledged that it has been a challenging few years in particular, for food producers.
“We’ve had extraordinary challenges from Covid-19, to the impact of the war in Ukraine, to inflation, and indeed many other pressures along the way, as well as constant asks from government around decarbonisation, sustainability, improved measurement tools and a change in mindset in many ways, in terms of how we produce, add value to and manage food production.”
He thanked the food businesses and others in attendance at the event for their efforts to ensure Irish produce and tourism remains attractive on a global scale.