181. Deputy Ciarán Ahern asked the Minister for Climate, Energy and the Environment whether a food business that has an existing commercial arrangement or partnership with a surplus food redistribution platform, through which unsold or surplus food is made available to the public or donated rather than sent to disposal, would be considered to have fulfilled its obligation to propose a donation agreement under Action 25 of the draft National Food Waste Prevention Roadmap 2026-2028; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [56333/26]

The revised Waste Framework Directive that entered into force in October 2025 includes a strengthened focus on surplus food donation and redistribution. This includes that Member States shall, after consulting with food banks and other food redistribution organisations, take measures, where appropriate, on the basis of any existing national food donation system, to ensure that economic operators identified by Member States as having a significant role in the prevention and generation of food waste, propose donation agreements to food banks and to other food redistribution organisations so as to facilitate the donation of unsold food that is safe for human consumption, and at a reasonable cost to economic operators. Ireland is required to transpose the revised Directive into national law by June 2027.

To inform policy development on surplus food redistribution and donation the Department has funded the Food Circle Project, a two-year grant agreement that was established with FoodCloud in August 2024. Supported by the Circular Economy Fund, key deliverables for this Project have included a number of reports and associated recommendations which can be accessed at the following link: www.food.cloud/foodcircle.

The draft National Food Waste Prevention Roadmap 2026-2028, recently published by the Department for public consultation also includes a range of proposed measures related to food donation and redistribution. The proposed Action 25 in the draft Roadmap concerns the identification of economic operators that have a significant role in the prevention and generation of food waste for the purpose of proposing donation agreements to food banks and other food redistribution organisations so as to facilitate the donation of unsold food that is safe for human consumption. This proposed action also includes the establishment of a mechanism to ensure such operators put in place arrangements to propose donation agreements to food banks and other redistribution organisations. As the draft National Food Waste Prevention Roadmap 2026-2028 is currently subject to public consultation, no final policy decision has been taken in relation to the proposed Action 25.

The Food Circle Reports, the final National Food Waste Prevention Roadmap, and ongoing consultation with food banks and other food redistribution organisations in line with the revised Waste Framework Directive will inform the measures that are needed in order to fulfil requirements related to surplus food donation agreements.