There is a lot of interest in resurrecting the beet industry and meetings held around the country have attracted large audiences.

Beet Ireland explained that it is looking for 1,000 growers to invest €1,000 in a grower’s co-op.

The €1 million would then be matched by Beet Ireland in the form of the site for the beet plant.

That €2 million will be used in the planning process and growers would then be asked to invest another sum of money – the amount would be dependent on other funding that is secured.

If secured those 1,000 growers will need to produce 1.4 million tonnes of beet per year.

This equates to approx. 50 acres per grower which is quite realistic.

210,000 tonnes of sugar and 19 million litres of bio-ethanol would be produced from this amount of beet.

A new beet industry would generate a big increase in new farm machinery sales and of course beet pulp would become a popular ingredient in compound feeds.