An additional €5.4m in research grant awards for agri-food research has been announced by the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Michael Creed.
The largest award of almost €3m relates to the Greenbreed project, led by Teagasc, which aims to develop tools and resources to continuously improve the environmental footprint of the dairy, beef and sheep sectors.
Currently, no country in the world directly selects for environmental traits within their ruminant breeding programme, making this project particularly noteworthy, the Department of Agriculture said.
Minister Creed said: ‘‘The investment in Greenbreed will put Ireland at the cutting edge internationally in terms of innovative research in animal breeding for reduced environmental footprint.
“It will contribute to my Department’s ongoing strategic investments to ensure that the long-term sustainability of Irish agriculture is placed on the strongest possible footing, in line with the Food Wise strategy.’’
A signature for Irish grass-fed beef
Another project that is to receive funding, to the tune of €594,116, is Beef-Sig – a signature of Irish grass-fed beef.
While Irish beef is increasingly marketed on the basis of the uniqueness of its grass-based production, there is currently no way of proving to what extent Irish cattle are grass-fed or proving that Irish beef for the US market meets the “more than 80% grass diet” standard, for example.
The project aims to establish if there is a unique grass-fed “signature” in Irish grass-fed beef. This will involve measuring compositional differences in beef from Irish farms with different levels of grass feeding, and comparing Irish grass-fed beef with beef from other competitor countries.
The research will provide scientifically based evidence to support the authenticity of Irish grass-based beef production and underpin grass-fed claims used to market Irish beef.
Other grants
Other new grant awards announced relate to projects on:
The development of advanced technologies for the detection and control of microbial contaminants to increase the shelf-life and safety of food products (€534,018).The optimal use of bio-active fish components for health enhancement (€633,248 co-funded with DAERA). A project to examine the effects of dietary fibres on gut microbiota and metabolic health in at-risk individuals (€628,991).Commenting on the awards, Minister Creed said his Department’s investment in this agri-food research will support the sector to innovate in terms of production efficiency, higher-value products and environmental sustainability.
“I hope that it will also raise awareness of the contribution the sector can make to Ireland’s sustainable bio-economy in the future.”
In addition to the awards announced earlier in July, this brings the total grants awarded for collaborative inter-institutional agri-food research under the Department’s 2017 competitive research call to over €19m.
Read more
Grazed grass leads to lower GHG emissions
Sustainability: Ireland can score into the constantly moving goalposts
An additional €5.4m in research grant awards for agri-food research has been announced by the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Michael Creed.
The largest award of almost €3m relates to the Greenbreed project, led by Teagasc, which aims to develop tools and resources to continuously improve the environmental footprint of the dairy, beef and sheep sectors.
Currently, no country in the world directly selects for environmental traits within their ruminant breeding programme, making this project particularly noteworthy, the Department of Agriculture said.
Minister Creed said: ‘‘The investment in Greenbreed will put Ireland at the cutting edge internationally in terms of innovative research in animal breeding for reduced environmental footprint.
“It will contribute to my Department’s ongoing strategic investments to ensure that the long-term sustainability of Irish agriculture is placed on the strongest possible footing, in line with the Food Wise strategy.’’
A signature for Irish grass-fed beef
Another project that is to receive funding, to the tune of €594,116, is Beef-Sig – a signature of Irish grass-fed beef.
While Irish beef is increasingly marketed on the basis of the uniqueness of its grass-based production, there is currently no way of proving to what extent Irish cattle are grass-fed or proving that Irish beef for the US market meets the “more than 80% grass diet” standard, for example.
The project aims to establish if there is a unique grass-fed “signature” in Irish grass-fed beef. This will involve measuring compositional differences in beef from Irish farms with different levels of grass feeding, and comparing Irish grass-fed beef with beef from other competitor countries.
The research will provide scientifically based evidence to support the authenticity of Irish grass-based beef production and underpin grass-fed claims used to market Irish beef.
Other grants
Other new grant awards announced relate to projects on:
The development of advanced technologies for the detection and control of microbial contaminants to increase the shelf-life and safety of food products (€534,018).The optimal use of bio-active fish components for health enhancement (€633,248 co-funded with DAERA). A project to examine the effects of dietary fibres on gut microbiota and metabolic health in at-risk individuals (€628,991).Commenting on the awards, Minister Creed said his Department’s investment in this agri-food research will support the sector to innovate in terms of production efficiency, higher-value products and environmental sustainability.
“I hope that it will also raise awareness of the contribution the sector can make to Ireland’s sustainable bio-economy in the future.”
In addition to the awards announced earlier in July, this brings the total grants awarded for collaborative inter-institutional agri-food research under the Department’s 2017 competitive research call to over €19m.
Read more
Grazed grass leads to lower GHG emissions
Sustainability: Ireland can score into the constantly moving goalposts
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