The Secretary General of the Department of Agriculture and Food, Mr John Malone, said some 80 per cent of staff at the Department were already located outside Dublin city and he did not see any major difficulties with decentralising the head office other than the provision of office space.
The Department of Agriculture head offices are to transfer to Portlaoise as part of the controversial Budget announcement by the Minister for Finance, Mr McCreevy, earlier this month.
Mr Malone, who lives in Co Kildare, said he could be in a Portlaoise office in 45 minutes from his home where as it took one hour and 15 minutes to make the journey to Kildare Street in Dublin.
"We already have 200 people down in the special beef department down there but we will need additional space," he said.
"However, it is going to take time and it is a three year programme," he added.
"We as a Department are well down the road to decentralisation with 80 per cent of our staff located outside Dublin city," he said.
He added that the Department had major offices in Castlebar, Co Mayo, Cavan, Wexford and Clonakilty in Co Cork.
He said there was no difficulty about staff meetings because the Department already used video conferencing facilities to link its offices.
He said staff travelling to and from Brussels would be moving through the Dublin office and he did not see any major difficulties. He did not see any difficulties either, he said, in arranging meetings with senior officials from other Government Departments.
The Department's Dublin staff were sounded out last Friday by the human resources section seeking their interest in transferring to bases in the provinces.
The initial response, according to Department sources, was very poor and many senior management are opposed to moving from the city.
The Department of Agriculture has a staff of 4,500 and only 1,000 work in Dublin.
The Department's offices on Kildare Street are also being seen as a possible location for the Dublin base of a number of other decentralised Departments when agriculture staff have moved out.