Future of farming - A welcome vote of confidence

The centrality of agriculture in our society and economy was reaffirmed by two events yesterday.

One was entirely positive and very welcome, the other maybe a tad less so.

The announcement by the Kerry Group, for a long time one of the standard bearers in innovation and ensuring every opportunity to generate added value in the sector was realised, announced that it will create 900 jobs over four years at a €100m global technology and innovation centre in Naas, Co Kildare.

Though its roots run very deep in Ireland, Kerry Group has a global reach — 24,000 employees in manufacturing, sales, technology and application centres across Europe, North America, South America, Australia, New Zealand, and Asia and annual sales of about €5bn — so it could have built this internationally coveted facility in any one of a number of countries.

It is certain that it would have been offered many inducements to do so but its decision to locate in Ireland is the kind of vote of confidence that this country so very badly needs. Because Kerry Group is such a respected global player, this endorsement turns cheerleading into achievement and will probably do more for our international reputation than any number of political pronouncements. It is practical patriotism of the very best kind.

It emphasises again the need for us to continually improve our educational standards to ensure that enough graduates have the appropriate qualifications and at an appropriate standard to build on the opportunities announcements like this offer. It suggests, too, that we must move quickly to make the sciences and maths more popular in our schools than they are. If we do maybe we can rely on objective argument rather than national loyalty to attract more projects like that announced yesterday.

The other event, the Irish Farmers’ Association day of action, is less clear cut. IFA president John Bryan warned: “Taoiseach Enda Kenny and [Agriculture] Minister Simon Coveney… have to fight a battle in Europe to defend our vital national interest… very clearly we are saying that any cuts will be unacceptable.”

How or why the IFA imagines any sector can avoid cuts needs explaining, especially as a very minor cut in Ireland’s overall receipts from the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) is anticipated. A loss of about 1.4% is expected which is, in the context of an enlarged EU, seems less than dramatic and compared to cuts in other areas of society almost enviable.

The European Commission also wants to re-engineer how Ireland’s €1.2bn share of the CAP budget is allocated, increasing some farmers incomes and, therefore, reducing others. Current arrangements copper-fasten incomes based on production levels recorded over a decade ago. The commission wants to introduce a flat rate based on farm size which may hit production in Leinster and Munster — the most productive farmers — but bolster farm incomes in Ulster and Connacht.

Yesterday’s demonstration in defence of the status quo suggests the IFA — with the support of Agriculture Minister Simon Coveney — are determined to protect the minority of farmers who enjoy the lion’s share of the CAP cake rather than support all farmers equally.

We are once again, at the point where we need to decide if the CAP is a social policy or a way of supporting an industry struggling to generate the profits it needs to survive.