“Morocco is a country with whom we have an existing trade in agri-food already and which is showing phenomenal growth in recent years but this week has highlighted the potential for this to grow much further,” said Minister for agriculture Michael Creed. “On a political level we have succeeded in deepening the collaboration between our two countries on matters of agri-food and we have a number of follow-up priorities including advancing our application for sheepmeat access.”

Agri-food exports from Ireland to went from around €8 million in 2013 to almost €14.5 million in 2015 and are expected to rise further.

A meeting with Zineb El Adaoui, a direct representative of the King Mohammed VI, and with the President of the Region of Souss Massa Brahim El Hafidi “gave us the opportunity to outline our origin green programme and also discuss areas of potential mutual cooperation under the umbrella of Sustainable Food Systems Ireland.”

Aside from finding new markets for Irish produce, the mission also creates a platform for the Moroccan government to seek expertise that Ireland has built up in relation to its agricultural industry. David Butler from Sustainable Food Systems Ireland (SFSI) also met with political representatives in Morocco to see how a partnership type approach could be developed between the two countries.

“With the countries we trade with this is strongly in demand, Ireland has put in place the technologies and systems and is highly regarded in that area,” Butler said. “Morocco has a very well defined vision of what it wants to do. It has been doing its ‘Green Morocco’ plan for the last eight years.”

The plan has moved from increasing investment in the sector to focusing on benefitting small holdings.

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“Where our experience is particularly strong is in technologies in certain sectoral areas. So for instance in the whole livestock area in terms of imporving genetic merit,” Butler said. He added that Ireland can also share its expertise in terms of finding new routes to market and developing brands.

Algeria

On Saturday the trade mission continued in Algeria where events in the coming days will include bilaterals with the Ministry of Agriculture and with the Algerian State Agency ONIL who manage public procurement of dairy products making them one of the largest buyers of dairy produce in the world.

Algeria is the second largest importer of powdered milk in the world, after China, and Ireland already provides 4.5% of their milk powder imports and 23% of cheese imports into Algeria.

“In the last three years Irish agri-food exports to Algeria have almost doubled in value from just under €23 million in 2013 to just over €41 million in 2015,” Creed said. “In the first eight months of 2016 the value of Irish food exports to Algeria grew by 39% on the same period in the previous year. This is mainly dominated by dairy but in both this sector and others we believe there is significant scope for growth.”

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North African trade mission visits Morocco's largest co-op

Watch: visit the largest dairy farm in Morocco