Kilkenny speakers to the fore as UCC triumph in Great Agri-Food Debate

A UCC team powered by two magnificant Kilkenny speakers have been judged the winners of the 10th Annual Great Agri-Food debate, organised by Dawn Meats and co-sponsored by McDonald’s.

The team secured the win by defeating UCD in what the judges described as a tightly contested and high-quality Grand Final.

UCC were declared the winners having successfully proposed the motion that: “Artificial Intelligence will create opportunities for farms to improve productivity sustainably and must be adopted as a matter of national policy”.

The team from UCC included team captain Aoife Lynch from Callan in County Kilkenny, co-speakers Anna Ryan (Cork), Apoorva Unde (Kilkenny City), Claudine Lynch (Ennis), and researcher Yuelin Zhan, who is from Beijing in China and studying Food Science & Technology.

Picture: UCC team captain Aoife Lynch, from Callan, County Kilkenny

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The four UCC speakers are all fourth year Nutritional Sciences students at UCC.

The Great Agri-Food Debate provides an opportunity for agriculture students from colleges and universities in Ireland and the UK to compete by debating topical issues relevant to the agri-food sector.   

In total, seven teams across Ireland and the UK entered the highly popular competition.

Teams from University College Cork (UCC), University College Dublin (UCD), Dundalk Institute of Technology (DkIT), College of Agriculture, Food and Rural Enterprise (CAFRE), Munster Technological University (MTU), Atlantic Technological University (ATU), and South East Technological University (SETU) faced off in Portlaoise in November 2025 to advance to the Grand Final.

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Advancing to the Grand Final, UCC won their semi-final debate against SETU, opposing the motion: “Agriculture and Food Nutrition education should be core subjects in the school curriculum”, while SETU proposed.

The Grand Final was judged by Richard Clinton, Group Commercial Director of Dawn Meats, Jim Roynane, McDonald's Restaurants Franchisee, Phelim O'Neil, Market Intelligence and EU Specialist at Irish Farmers Journal, Dale Crammond, Director of Meat Industry Ireland, and Eimear Brazil, Chef and influencer (@TheKitchenShift_).

Picture: UCC team co-speaker Apoorva Unde from Kilkenny City

The Grand Final was moderated by Tom Moran, Chairman at Kerry Group and Alliance New Zealand.

Richard Clinton, Group Commercial Director at Dawn Meats, stated that the competition continues to be "of great importance and value to Dawn Meats and McDonald’s."

"It’s a unique opportunity for us to meet and hear from the next generation of agri-food leaders on the issues and challenges that are crucial to the future of our industry," he said.

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"The debates are always of a high standard and the commitment and hard work of the debaters, their researchers and their lecturers is always impressive.

"We take great pride in continuing this tradition and hope new voices will continue to be inspired to take part in the years to come.

"I’d like to congratulate everyone who took part this year and, of course, this year’s winning team, UCC. Many thanks to all involved, including the participants, judges and moderators, for making this event such a success.”

The recordings of this year’s debates are available on the Dawn Meats YouTube channel.

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