Funding worth nearly €1 million has been awarded to two new tillage focused research projects, the Minister of State at the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine announced today. (Monday, November 14)

Minister Martin Heydon confirmed details of the two projects, which originated from a European agrobiodiversity research call, as Science Week 2022 got underway.

“These two projects will provide practical knowledge on how diversity can improve our agricultural systems. They will focus on improving the resilience of barley and wheat crops across the EU, two of its most important crops. 

“A central element of the Food Vision 2030 Strategy is to restore and enhance biodiversity and this investment in research will be an important contributor to delivering on this commitment,” Heydon added.

The Minister said financial support for Irish researchers is being provided through the DAFM research programme.

The Minister said that it was crucial that Ireland continued “to invest in modernising and increasing the resilience” of its agri-food systems.

The government is keen to stress that science and research are “critical to the sustainable development of the agri-food, forest, marine and bioeconomy sector” throughout Science Week 2022.

The two recipients of the funding are:

CoordinatorPartnersProjectAward
Sonia NegraoUCDRecovering and Exploiting Old and New Barley Diversity for Future-Ready Agriculture  €496,505.13
Fiona Doohan UCD, TeagascIdentification and sustainable deployment of wheat genetic diversity to enhance the resilience and security of the European food supply.  €499,693.00  
Source: DAFM

The Minister also announced the launch of a new online dashboard that will give everyone access to a range of information and statistics on research being funded by the DAFM.

The dashboard will improve access to leading Irish research across a wide area of the agri-food system.

As part of Science Week 2022 Heydon also announced a series of webinars on projects that are being funded by the department.

They include:

  • the ‘Smartsward’ project assessing the use of multispecies swards for sustainable pasture-based farming;
  • four projects exploring the mitigation and monitoring of greenhouse gases from agriculture;
  • and two projects on the National Adult Food Consumption Survey and dietary guidelines for sustainable and healthy eating.

DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE FOOD AND THE MARINE SCIENCE WEEK 2022