The Irish agri-food educational body, Agri Aware, has confirmed a number of new appointments to its board of directors.
The new chair of Agri Aware is Shay Galvin, a Limerick beef and tillage farmer.
Galvin is a former chair of the Irish Farmers’ Association in Limerick and will replace Cork dairy farmer Alan Jagoe as the body’s chair.
The non-profit organisation is funded by the Irish farming and agri-food industry “to enhance the understanding of Irish farming and food production”.
Marcus O’Halloran, executive director of Agri Aware, has paid tribute to the outgoing chair who he said had been “instrumental in the success” of the organisation.
O’Halloran said during Jagoe’s time “successful programmes” had been launched across both primary and secondary schools and student participation in these programmes had increased from 30,000 in his first year to 131,000.
He said he was now looking forward to working with the new chair and outlined that his key objective was to “communicate the important role of Irish farmers, and the agri-food industry, in delivering quality, safe, and sustainably produced, traceable food that is affordable for consumers, whilst caring for our environment”.
Shay Galvin said he also wanted to build on the work of the organisation.
Galvin said:
“Increasing awareness of the relationship between our standard of excellence in farming, and the payoff in terms of excellence in the food we produce to eat and export is a key goal, while maintaining the unique green image we have here in Ireland”.
He said he understood the importance of “educating the general public from a young age in the role farming plays in all our daily lives”.
The organisation operates a number of primary and secondary programmes that in are run in accordance with the national school curriculum.
Meanwhile two other board appointments have also been made:
- Charles Smith has been re-appointed to the board of directors of Agri Aware representing ABP and Kepak and is the general manager of Certified Irish Angus;
- Joseph Tobin, who represents Tipperary on Dairygold’s board of directors and has been elected to the board.