Nitrates Usage Dail Éireann — 2024-09-26 ============================================================ Charlie McConalogue (FF), Donegal I expect it would be the same or very close to it. The average number of cows is 90. It is really important for those farmers, particularly those whose viability and capacity to continue into the future depend on that derogation, that we maintain it. As I have said, we are very confident that we can do that, looking to improve our water quality while supporting those farmers. Any removal of the derogation would not only impact the viability of many of our family farms, it would also significantly impact all of our sectors because it would lead to increased competition for land, resulting in challenges right across the farming sector. --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2024-09-26/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:53:16+00:00 Sitting date: 2024-09-26