Mary Coughlan's perspective
She is only too familiar with the phenomenon of Ireland's recent economic success increasing relative income poverty in the country. Something similar has happened to agriculture, once an economic leader, now dwarfed by industry and services.
Income from agriculture, forestry and fishing grew by only 24.4% between 1990 and 2002, compared with a 200% increase in non-agricultural wages, salaries and pensions.
This trend left many farmers on low incomes, and it was Ms Coughlan, as Minister for Social and Family Affairs until last week, who oversaw the payment of between €100 and €250 per week of Farm Assist aid to about 8,500 low income farmers.
So she knows at first hand the difficulties in farming, and the will be fully conscious of the vulnerability of many farmers, as she seeks to make her political mark in the sector.
Perhaps she will use her fresh perspective on behalf of consumers and taxpayers to bring their interests in the rural and agricultural sectors more to the fore. Although Taoiseach Bertie Ahern has ruled out removing agriculture from the name of the Department, the trend towards more attention for consumer and environmental issues is inevitable.
From her work on the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Tourism, Sport and Recreation, the new Minister is fully aware of the interests of other rural sectors, such as agri-tourism, and of the demands by society in general for greater protection for our soil, streams and rivers.
As the first woman Minister for Agriculture and Food, she can also be expected to have food consumers' interest at heart, an important requirement in her new post.
As well as understanding the needs of farmers, the new Minister must handle complex international and national negotiations, major legislative initiatives, major financial responsibilities, and food safety and consumer protection demands.
Farmers may reflect that it is a bad time to bring in a new Minister, as they enter the unknown territories of the Mid-Term Review (the Fischler reform) and the Nitrates Directive.
A close watch must be kept on the trends at farm level, which could be momentous, as production-linked subsidisation disappears. As always, farmers will have to rely to a great extent on the civil servants in her Department to help the Minister manage this transition.
She will probably be only too glad to leave the Nitrates Directive, another issue which promises to make the coming years momentous in Irish farming, to her colleague Dick Roche, the new Minister for Environment and Local Government.
The Government's environmental protection role had brought it to a number of standoffs with farmers, until Environment Minister Cullen recently adopted a more "softly, softly" approach to landowners.
Now Minister Roche must develop a relationship with farmers, and successfully negotiate a Nitrates Directive derogation which will allow commercial and everyday farming to be carried out in Ireland.
All in agriculture will wish success for Ministers Coughlan and Roche, and good judgement in using the generous amounts of funding which are available to the new Cabinet, in these prosperous times.
