THE so-called EU sugar reform, ill-conceived and ill-explained, resulted in the permanent loss of our 80-year-old thriving sugar industry, undermined our tillage farming and added millions of inefficient food miles to the sugar we use.

WITH rising energy prices and fuel supply uncertainties, Natural Resources Minister Noel Dempsey is to be complimented on his scheme to promote production of 163 million litres of biofuel from indigenous sources.