THE Irish government is to invest €8.8 million in the development of a new National Food Innovation Hub in Co Cork.
The Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine is to fund the facility at the Teagasc Moorepark Campus in Fermoy.
Speaking at the launch of the hub Taoiseach Leo Varadkar said the new centre will ensure Irish businesses remain at the forefront of the agri-food industry post-Brexit.
"Small and medium sized agri-food businesses are already preparing for Brexit by taking an innovative approach and opening up new European and international markets outside of the UK. This new National Food Innovation Hub will help Irish businesses to innovate and expand, keeping our agri-food sector competitive and attracting investment in a post-Brexit world.”
The primary objective of the National Food Innovation Hub is to create a business innovation network involving dairy companies, Moorepark Technology Ltd (MTL), incubator companies and public-private partnership based R&D programmes with a research focus on food processing, quality and nutrition. It involves constructing up to 12 customer application suites containing office and laboratory space, so that each company can have an on-campus presence.
The National Food Innovation Hub will be directly linked to both the Teagasc Food Research Centre and MTL to engender close collaboration between the research centres and the companies located on the Moorepark campus. It is envisaged that this unique food cluster will stimulate intensive collaboration between companies and Teagasc researchers to create a platform for innovation, economic growth and job creation.
Irish agriculture minister Michael Creed added: "This is a strategically important project for Ireland’s agri-food sector, especially in the context of Brexit, which poses enormous challenges for the sector by virtue of its reliance on the UK market, and the associated challenges in developing new markets and value added products."
The investment in the food hub comes on top of a €10 million investment by Teagasc and the dairy industry in MTL (Moorepark) to expand and upgrade its pilot processing facilities - this upgrade is currently underway.
