Food Wise 2025, the ten year strategy for the agri-food sector, identifies the opportunities and challenges facing the sector and provides an enabling strategy that will allow the sector to grow and prosper. Food Wise includes more than 400 specific recommendations, spread across the cross-cutting themes of sustainability, innovation, human capital, market development and competitiveness; as well as specific sectorial recommendations.
The implementation process for any strategy is vital for its success. I chair the Food Wise High Level Implementation Committee (HLIC), with high level representatives from all the relevant Departments and State agencies. The committee reviews progress on detailed actions on a quarterly basis, in order to identify and solve problems quickly. Stakeholders regularly present to the committee meetings on their priorities for particular sectors or themes and by the end of this year, the HLIC will have reviewed in detail progress on the five cross-cutting themes and the eleven individual sectors outlined in Food Wise 2025.
In light of the UK vote to leave the EU, Brexit has been included as a standard item on the agenda of each meeting of the HLIC. It is clear that driving the implementation of the Food Wise recommendations, particularly those related to market development, competitiveness and innovation, will assume even greater importance in the light of the UK decision.
I launched the second annual progress report of Food Wise 2025, Steps to Success 2017, on 5th July 2017. Steps to Success 2017 outlines what the Department and its agencies have achieved in year one and what they plan to achieve over the next 12 months.
Of the 368 actions that were due to commence by 2017 or are ongoing actions, there has been good progress to date:
- 46% of the actions have been achieved or substantial action has been undertaken.
- 49% of the actions have commenced and are progressing.
- 3% of the actions are at commencement stage with the expectation that they will be achieved in the timeframe associated with them.
- 2% actions have not yet commenced. Of these, four will commence later this year.
