IFA President Joe Healy has welcomed the agreement reached the EU and the UK to avoid a hard border.
Joe Healy said it was an important outcome for the farming and food sector here and has the potential to be helpful in resolving a number of the challenges that Brexit posed for the sector.
In particular, he said the text that the UK will maintain full alignment with those rules of the Internal Market and the Customs Union’ is significant in that it deals with the EU-UK relationship in its entirety.
Joe Healy also noted the commitment to ‘protecting North-South cooperation’ and that the deal ‘will ensure no regulatory barriers develop between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom’.
The IFA President acknowledged the work done by the Irish Government on behalf of farmers and he urged them to maintain that focus in the next phase of the discussions. The transition and the final deal on trade will be crucial.