Yesterday’s disclosure that the Teagasc Centre at Oak Park, Carlow, is to carry out field trials on a genetically modified potato that would improve resistance to blight, is viewed locally as welcome news for a county which itself has been ‘blighted’ by job losses in recent years.

A GROUP of former milk board employees, who remained work idle, were paid nearly €2 million by the Department of Agriculture over a seven-year period, it emerged yesterday.

A group of former milk board employees were paid for doing nothing by the Department of Agriculture over a seven-year period, it emerged today.

HOPE for control of such problems as obesity and colon cancer are springing from the new Teagasc Biotechnology Food Centre at Moorepark, Co Cork.