Funding to farmers may be cut

Athlone: A lively debate was triggered yesterday over suggestions that rural development funding should be shifted away from farming in the future.

Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs Minister Eamon Ó Cuiv raised the issue in an address to a meeting of the National Rural Development Forum in Athlone.

He said hard questions must asked as to whether rural prosperity can best be promoted through focusing the vast majority of the spending on direct farm investment or whether the development of a diversified rural economy and a consequent increase in spend on non-farming investment is the way forward.