The Irish Farmers’ Association (IFA) is set for numerous changes to give more voice to the grassroots members of the organisation, according to new IFA national president Tim Cullinan.

Cullinan told attendees at Laois IFA’s annual general meeting (AGM) in Abbeyleix last night, Monday, February 3, that he intends to: re-introducing regional meetings; bring about a more “open-door” policy regarding board input; and implement changes for county executive meetings around the country for more branch input.

Commenting on the current state of affairs on the beef sector, the new president said: “I just want to say a few words on changes I am going to bring to the association. In my own election it was the grassroots members that voted for me, which is a great thing.

I’ve committed to and want to get back to doing regional meetings. I want to come down even like tonight, to hear the concerns of people on the ground.

“It’s about listening to those farmers on the ground, sharing those concerns, taking them back up to the farm centre, by discussing these issues.

“It’s critical that we are listening to farmers on the ground – that’s number one.”

‘Open-door policy’

Continuing, the president noted that he wants an “open-door” policy to invite individual commodity committee chairs into the IFA national council for certain issues, depending on the topic.

“I will have an open-door policy that I will be inviting those chairs of those committees directly into the board.

In the past there was a bit of disconnect there, and I want to ensure that that disconnect is not there, that we see the problems coming down the tracks before they become a problem and head them off.

“I think that’s what we need to be at; for me I want to be hands on.”

The new president then turned to the livestock committee, which he also aims to reform:

“I want to re-look at the whole livestock committee as well and I think in a good way I want to – and will – sit down with the livestock committee and see what changes we’ll be doing there to make it more effective.

“No matter what business you’re in – and the IFA has been around a long time – but every business needs change and the IFA is no different to any other business; we need change as well,” the president stressed.

County executive changes

“I want to have a look at county executives. We all know – we may as well call it as it is – county executives are under pressure as well.

“I think we need to get to the stage where we have three or four or even five specialist meetings in each county every year; let it be one on dairy or grain or on beef or whatever the case may be.

I think what would be an excellent idea would be to put the county executives back out to the branches.

“At the end of the day the branches are the lifeblood of the IFA. Having county executives out in branches, maybe get the branch to host the county executive – and maybe have it out in different areas around the county – I think that would be good for the association,” Cullinan concluded.