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Chapter 1: What are the current challenges with peat usage in horticulture?
So I asked the two government departments responsible for legislating in this area for a response to that charge from John Neenan that the government's failure to provide a workable set of regulations for the industry meant that the blame for any fines incurred if Ireland loses this case should fall on the government's shoulders.
Well, I got on to the two departments responsible, and you'll enjoy this. The Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage said that the case was being handled by the Department of Climate, Energy and the Environment.
So I got on to the Department of Climate, Energy and the Environment, and they said that enforcement at smaller sites was a matter for the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage. So the two responses from both departments, neither of them actually addressed the claim that John made.
John in Leitrim has texted, 51222, the horticultural crowd's argument about peat being a necessity doesn't hold water. I've been harvesting and composting bracken, which makes a great lime-free composting. No problem. The bracken is self-generating and sustainable. Well done, John.
The horticulture sector's problem, though, is that the margins in growing fruit and veg, what supermarkets pay growers, is so finely calculated that even a tiny drop in yield because of a change of compost could push them into the red. 51551 is the text number, not what I just said. 51551.
So, let's just go and talk a little bit more detail about the alternatives and what John Neenan said there about the possibility about wrapping up on bogs within 10 years. Where are we at in developing completely peat-free alternative composts so that we can stop cutting up bogs to grow food?
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Chapter 2: What alternatives to peat are being explored for composting?
Chagask, our agricultural research agency, is in the middle of a lot of work in this area. A lot of work because each fruit or veg or plant will require different growing mediums. One size absolutely will not grow all here. So I met Dr Michael Gaffney at Chagask's Ashtown Research Facility to see how close they were to a workable peat alternative.
And so this is a material that we have developed as part of the project.
It's a fibre material developed from agricultural... In one greenhouse, there's tomatoes growing in experimental rectangles of recycled fibre instead of peat.
Tomatoes are doing very well on it. It's a very small initial study. This is viburnum. It's a common ornamental plant. This has been grown in a two-liter pot. We have hypericum. We have Carex, which is a grass.
In the nursery, there's all manner of shrubs and experimental non-peat mixes being grown alongside plants in traditional peat to see how they compare.
They're doing quite well.
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Chapter 3: How effective are non-peat growing mediums for different plants?
Now for a commercial grower, they would absolutely see differences and challenges in terms of the quality of the plants.
In light sealed chambers, there's mushrooms in a non-peat mix that is nearly, if just not quite there yet.
In our latest trials, we have produced crops that are... 91% of what we would expect to get with peat. So we're 9% off.
As far as a mushroom grower would be concerned, 9% is the difference between profitability and going bankrupt.
Yeah, and I think it's sometimes when you hear debates around the use of peat in horticulture, can we grow mushrooms without peat? That would be a yes at the moment from where we stand. Can we grow mushrooms that fit within the economic realities of growing mushrooms commercially? Not at the moment.
In another greenhouse, there's strawberries racing against each other to see which non-peat mix of ingredients yields the best results.
Nearly all strawberries, I would say, in Ireland are grown in coir, not peat anymore.
Coconut husk.
So coconut husk. And strawberry performs well in that material, so that has made that transition easier.
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Chapter 4: What role does Chagask play in developing peat alternatives?
It was challenging at the start, so...
And now that you've arrived at a more perfected product or growing medium, how are the strawberries doing? As well as they were before in peat?
I think in general, yeah, they're doing as well, maybe even a little bit better probably. You know, the plants are performing very well in this material. And there's all different types. So in general, what we're looking at across this are varying mixes of bark and wood fibre and coir.
Is the national broadcaster allowed to sample one of the fruits? Absolutely, absolutely. That isn't going to create problems, is it?
It's not going to create, we'll put it into the spreadsheet.
Well, that's very sweet, that's lovely. Yeah, they're not bad. And in yet another greenhouse, there's something even more cutting edge and probably important. Can we create a compost from things found on the island to avoid having to import coconuts from Kerala?
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Chapter 5: Can we grow mushrooms without peat and what are the economic implications?
These are some materials that have been created from anaerobic digestate and straw, and they've been composted down.
Now, the anaerobic digestate would originally have been a combination of what, grass silage and manure?
Exactly, yes. When we started off working on this, one of the things we had to understand was how much of these materials, of these potential components for a peat-free mix, are available on the island of Ireland. So there's no point developing a peat-free material where you don't actually have enough of that material.
This is the MacGyver approach. It's looking around the locked room to see what's there to get you out of trouble. And you're not allowed to magic up anything else. You can only make do with the stuff that's in the room.
We wanted to be able to say, I think if we're transitioning from peat, I think for us the ideal, and I think even for growers, is that there is security in knowing that there is enough of an alternative available within close proximity on the island.
So if we look at the sum total of your research, and I know this is a very crude way of doing it, but if you look across the range of different non-peat alternatives that you've produced... You've proved the concept. You've proved that the science is good, that the growing can be done. What you haven't proved is commercial viability.
I think it is for a lot of the crop systems.
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Chapter 6: What materials are being considered for peat-free compost on the island?
We know that we can produce a crop without peat. But yes, can we produce a crop at the price point that is required and that people are willing to pay?
And will somebody come to Ireland and produce that non-peat alternative? Does anybody see it as being worth their while to do it?
Well, that is the next thing, is that you have to have production systems for some of these materials to come through. If nobody is producing it and if it's not available to growers, well, then they can't use it. In the end of the day, growers are exactly what they are. They're growers. They don't want to become growing media manufacturers as well as growers.
The technology exists. The question, the open or still unanswered question now is, is the support there, is the finance there to make it work?
Yes, I would say that. But also I would caution that any transition to non-peat materials will result in higher costs for growers, more than likely lower yields and potentially lower quality too. So that has to be factored into the overall, I suppose, economic argument about the transition.
Dr. Michael Gaffney at Chagask's Ashtown Research Facility.
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Chapter 7: What are the future prospects for peat alternatives in agriculture?
Fascinating work going on there. Beyond Pete on the Chagask website if you want to learn more. Now, we have stacked all of the good news in this morning's programme into the second half of the programme. Back after these.