Agri-food sector holds the key to national recovery

THE country is gearing up for one of the harshest budgets we have seen in a long time. This summer has produced the Bord Snip report, the Commission on Taxation report and the NAMA legislation is before the Dáil.

A black cloud is hanging over us as the Minister for Finance deliberates cuts and further taxation measures.

All in all, government strategy looks likely to try and cut and tax its way out of economic recession. But where is the planning, where are the initiatives to get Ireland back to work, to stop the haemorrhaging of jobs and indigenous enterprises from rural areas, to promote rural regeneration and to revitalise the indigenous agri-food sector?