Former ABP chief executive Paul Finnerty, UCD professor emeritus of entrepreneurship Frank Roche and Mella Frewen, director general of the industry body FoodDrink Europe, "will drive insight for the food industry on the benefits of investing in innovation", Minister Creed said.

Finnerty now heads the Yield Lab Ireland, an ag-tech investment firm. Frewen's group represents Europe's food and drink sector and Dr Roche is chair of Dublin Business Innovation Centre, director of entrepreneurial strategy for UCD and holds the Berber Family Chair of Entrepreneurship at the UCD Michael Smurfit School of Business.

Innovation capacity

Enterprise Ireland and the Department of Agriculture will provide a secretariat for the work of their team. The Food Wise 2025 strategy has set an objective to "establish a high-level core team to review current agri-food sector innovation capacity, the utilisation of this capacity and to better market the Irish agri-food sector’s innovation capabilities".

Minister Creed made the announcement at a meeting of the FoodWise implementation committee, which also heard from the Health and Safety Authority on the farm safety implications of the 70% increase in production and 85% in exports targeted for the agri-food sector in the 10 years to 2025.

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