A meeting at government buildings yesterday (Wednesday, October 5) between Tánaiste and Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment Leo Varadkar and farm organisations has been described as “very constructive”.
The second roundtable meeting of its kind, which was also attended by Minister of State at the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM) Martin Heydon, follows a similar event in March.
“It was a very constructive meeting lasting two hours, attended by the Tánaiste and Minister Martin Heydon,” a spokesperson for the Tánaiste told Agriland.
“It was a good opportunity for the Tánaiste and minister to engage directly with the farming organisations.”
Among those in attendance at the meeting was the deputy president of the Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers’ Association (ICMSA), Denis Drennan, who said that government policy on farming and emissions must include commercial family farms.
He called for an end to the “useless and regressive ‘either/or’ approach between organic and commercial” farming.
Drennan claimed that the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) Strategic Plan, approved by Cabinet on Tuesday (October 4), demonstrates an “active exclusion” of commercial family farms, in particular dairy.
He said that “no effort had been made” to make the new Agri Climate Rural Environmental Scheme (ACRES) appealing or workable for commercial dairy farmers.
“We have consistently pointed out to the government that if we are to make anything near the kind of emissions’ reductions they have set out while preserving the economic ‘motor’ that is our commercial dairy sector, we have to design schemes that bring in the commercial family farms that want to participate.
“The government’s approach as typified by ACRES is predicated on excluding those farms – the actual basis for our dairy and beef sectors- and effectively supporting niche farming or land stewardship models that are already marginal to the national model.
“It’s self-evident that this policy of excluding commercial and focusing on organics or niche farming has no chance of getting the kind of critical mass in terms of emissions reductions that the government policy claims to want.
“It’s actually working to exclude the very type of farms that the policy needs if it is to have any chance of getting that momentum,” Drennan said.
The ICMSA deputy president repeated that environmental policy “has to address real commercial needs and concerns” if it is to secure “critical buy-in” from farmers.
“Policy and schemes must be designed to be both environmentally progressive and commercially feasible,” Drennan said.