Call to recognise expertise

SPENDING one or two years in agricultural college is all very well, but don’t expect it to do anything for your credibility if you ever end up in court over some farming matter, even if you have decades of farming experience.

That was the verdict of farmers in the recent Limerick IFA meeting at Adare, when discussion turned to qualifications.

Speakers revealed a sore point about “experts”, with Ballingarry, Co Limerick dairy farmer Gerard Cronin telling his fellow farmers, “no matter what farm courses I do or what experience I have, the word of someone quarter my age with letters after their name is taken in court before me”. He said, “It is ridiculous that a farmer’s opinion has no legal standing in a court, he is only regarded as an interested observer, but someone with a few letters after their name is regarded as an expert, no matter that they have no experience of the job”.

He said a graduate fresh from college has more legal standing, but it was overdue that farmers were recognised for their experience and knowledge, and no longer treated as knowing nothing about the business that is their livelihood.

John O’Shea, Kildimo said young people entering farming now have done their Green Certs. “But it appears that you have to have a few letters after your name to become an expert”.

Limerick IFA has asked the National Council to consider a remedy to this lack of legal recognition of farmers as experts in their own field of animal husbandry and food production.