Teagasc sees Cork as food hub
The Food Hub would encompass pilot plant facilities (in the form of a futuristic Moorepark Technology Ltd), together with 20 newly-built customer application units which would be private “carded spaces” to be occupied by industry.
Each of these units would contain office and laboratory space, so that each industry client could conduct new product development within their own “Embassy”.
These units would be physically linked to the pilot plant, facilitating manufacturing to pilot scale, which would allow each company to produce product for quality assessment and test marketing.
Access to and support from the internationally-recognised Teagasc food research programme would ensure a pipeline of research and innovation to fuel new product development and technology based high potential start-up (HPSU) companies.
The principal objective of the “Hub” is to create a network for innovation and business development involving companies, research institutes, experimental facilities, incubators and public-private partnership research and development programmes for food, health and nutrition.
The proposal would result in a unique regional food cluster in terms of intensive collaboration between companies and research centres, to develop innovations as the basis for new food products and processes, leading to economic growth and jobs.
The Hub concept would leverage findings from research centres such as the Alimentary Pharmabiotic Centre Biosciences Institute in UCC, Food for Health Ireland, the Dairy Processing Technology Centre hosted by the University of Limerick, and the Meat Technology Centre.
The Cork Food Hub is proposed by Teagasc in its submission to the new agri-food strategy up to 2025 which Agriculture Minister Simon Coveney expects to publish in July.
