Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 6 February 2025
202. Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine to provide a detailed breakdown of all funding allocated for the year ahead or spent in the past fiscal year by his Department on artificial intelligence systems or artificial intelligence research; what programs or Department operations, if any, are conducted using artificial intelligence tools; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [3701/25]
Amharc ar fhreagraMy Department has funded the following Artificial Intelligence (AI) projects in the past fiscal year:
2024 Funding:
• In respect of Cognitive Services, €2,888 was spent over the course of 2024, researching potential artificial intelligence benefits for my Department.
• Related Cloud Infrastructure, to support those services, totalled €2,805 in the same period.
2025 Funding:
• No new funding has been allocated in the upcoming fiscal year.
The following projects within the department, for research and analysis purposes, currently use Artificial Intelligence.
• Predicting the likelihood of TB outbreaks.
• Image analysis for identifying species susceptible to H5N1 (Bird flu).
• Customer Segmentation analysis for developing Agri-Food policies.
• Analysis for identifying risk factors for Microbial Food Safety.
• Analysing content to produce IT documentation.
• Automatically Preparing IT test scenarios.
The following Department operations, are conducted using artificial intelligence tools.
• Smart text analysis to prevent and contain data breaches.
All current and future use cases are subject to human review, data protection and governance measures. My Department is committed to ensuring that any use of AI is informed by an assessment of any potential human rights and equality implications, with a need for careful management in accordance with privacy and broader ethical and legal frameworks.
