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President opens the 83rd National Ploughing Championships

Ratheniska, Stradbally, Co. Laois, 23rd September 2014

It is a great pleasure to be back again to the townland of Ratheniska, here in County Laois, for this eighty-third holding of the National Ploughing Championships. Last year, more than 220,000 people attended the Championships – breaking a new record in the history of what can undeniably be described as the most beloved rendezvous in Ireland’s rural calendar.

During the eight decades that have elapsed since their foundation, in 1931, the Championships have grown to become one of Europe’s largest outdoor event and agricultural trade show. I have no doubt that this year’s gathering will once again be a highlight for both farmers and town dwellers, contestants and visitors, and for the young and the old alike.

Ba mhaith liom comhghairdeas a ghabháil le foireann iomlán Chumann Treabhdóireachta na hÉireann agus lena Stiúrthóir Bainistíochta le daichead bliain anuas, Anna May McHugh, arb é a díograis agus a proifisiúntacht bhuan-sheasmhach a chuireann ar ár gcumas pléisiúr a bhaint as an ócáid seo in athuair bliain i ndiaidh bliana. Thairis sin, ba mhaith liom buíochas speisialta a ghabháil lenár n-óstaigh don dara bhliain as a chéile, muintir Chartúir, agus leis na feirmeoirí uilig máguaird a chuir a gcuid tailte ar fáil le haghaidh treabhdóireachta agus loctha feithiclí.

[May I congratulate all of the National Ploughing Association’s team, including its Managing Director of four decades, Anna May McHugh, whose dedication and unfaltering professionalism allow us, year after year, to take renewed pleasure in the ploughing. I also wish to extend particular thanks to our hosts for the second year in a row, the Carter family, and to all the neighbouring farmers who have made their land available for ploughing and parking.]

I know that the feedback from the landowners, the local community and the wider public was very positive, and that they welcomed seeing a return of the National Ploughing Championships to Stradbally, a site which is easily accessible by both road and public transport. Again this year, the success of Championships relies on the hard work of the Laois Ploughing Association and the help of the hundreds of volunteers who have travelled from all across the country to act as judges, supervisors or stewards: to each and every one of you, I offer our thanks for your valuable contribution.

Visits to the National Ploughing Championships, for me as for all visitors, are an encounter with rural Ireland and the real economy in its best sense. They are a convivial affair in which to meet old friends, enjoy the music and entertainment, acquaint oneself with the latest developments in machinery and farming techniques, taste a variety of Irish food, and get an overview of the best that Ireland’s agriculture has to offer.

These three days are a wonderful occasion on which people from all the counties of Ireland meet, discuss their achievements and concerns, and, of course, admire the skills of our contesting ploughmen and women.

The diversity of competition classes featured at the National Ploughing Championships – twenty-six this year, including loy digging – bears testimony to the impressive variety of skills involved in the art of ploughing. Conventional and reversible; single, double and triple-furrow ploughs; junior and senior; vintage and horse ploughs: all these categories attest, not only to the vitality of Irish ploughing, but also to the dynamism of Ireland’s farming sector as a whole.

Agriculture is a cornerstone of Ireland’s society, economy and identity. All of you here know the special place that the land and its care, and so many aspects of rural Irish life, hold in our history and our hearts. Today the agri-food sector supports 300,000 people in employment nationally. This sector not only plays an important role in providing for the domestic market, but it has also proved able to conquer international markets, with exports nearing €10 billion last year, to over 175 countries. Irish beef, lamb and dairy have a well-established reputation internationally, and I can assure you that during my visits abroad, I never miss an occasion to be the proud ambassador of Irish food and agricultural produce.

With global demand for food forecast to increase by 70% until 2050, we have every reason to be confident in the potential for growth of Irish farming. The upcoming abolition of milk quotas will also open new, stimulating opportunities for the dairy industry.

It is essential that the farming community ensures that the fruit yielded by these new opportunities are shared by the many, and not just divided among the biggest. Indeed, I believe that it is equally important to build up Irish agriculture’s capacity to expand into new markets globally, as it is to foster a thriving family farming sector, allowing as many who wish so as possible to make a viable living out of farming.

Many of you here this morning are aware that 2014 has been declared the International Year of Family Farming by the United Nations. This is an important gesture, aimed at focusing attention on the vital role played by family farming, and small holder farming more broadly, in alleviating hunger and poverty, in providing food security, in fostering the development of rural areas, and in allowing for a sustainable management of the natural resources we share on this fragile planet.

While hunger may not be as pressing an issue here in Ireland as it is in other parts of the world, this International Year of Family Farming offers an important reminder of the huge challenges faced by small farmers everywhere in the world. It provides a framework inviting all those concerned to unite forces in order to respond to those challenges.

In Ireland, the average family farm income was less than €26,000 in 2013, down from over €30,000 in 2011. Of course, this average glosses over very different realities between various sectors and regions of Ireland, but it remains a revealing indicator of the difficult financial situation in which too many Irish farmers find themselves.

All of us, as members of society, benefit from the balance that a viable family farming sector provides, and farmers are entitled to our support in ensuring that viability in any way that we can.

Enabling young farmers to access the land they need to make a living in agriculture is perhaps the greatest of all the challenges for the future of family farming in Ireland. There is great hope in the recent Central Applications Office’s statistics, which show that demands for third level places on an agriculture or food course have experienced the steepest rise of all courses over the last two years. More and more young Irish people, including students from non-farming backgrounds, are showing an interest in rural issues and farming life.

Yet, currently, many young farmers who want to take up farming and are fully qualified to do so cannot find land. The trends I mentioned in my speech last year, drawing on an important study commissioned by Macra na Feirme, entitled “Land Mobility and Succession in Ireland” – these trends have, unfortunately, not yet been reversed.

The current age structure of Ireland’s farming population is a great matter for concern: only 6% of Irish farmers are under the age of thirty-five, while 51.4% of family farm holders are over fifty-five, and 28.3% over the retirement age of sixty-five. Too many farmers have no designated person to whom they plan to transfer the farm, either because they have no direct heirs, or – if they do – because these relatives have opted to pursue an alternative career.

Very little farmland, less than 0.5% per annum, is transferred in Ireland in any given year. 40,000 farmers are currently in conacre arrangements, while only a little over 6,000 avail of long-term leases. It is therefore greatly encouraging to see that the farming community, farmers’ representative organisations and training bodies are committed to tackling these crucial issues.

I was delighted to hear of the Conference on Collaborative Farming organised by Teagasc last April, and to learn that Macra na Feirme launched, also in April 2014, a “Land Mobility Service” run on a pilot basis in the Kilkenny, Roscommon and Muskerry areas. Such initiatives are highly commendable, addressing as they do the misconceptions that still surround long-term leasing in our country, and exploring the great potential that exists in various forms of collaborative farming – whether registered farm partnerships, long-term leases or share farming. We need more of such initiatives, that will enable older farmers to make plans for their retirements while allowing a new generation of farmers to get started.

There is, in today’s Ireland, a profusion of stimulating ideas and actions from which we can draw renewed hope for the future of family farming in our country: a flexible approach to credit solutions; the potential offered by agro-tourism; local innovation and local product development – the many ways in which farmers can transform and add value to their produce, and market it locally, thus emancipating themselves from the deadly grip of commodity prices fluctuations – these are but of few of the creative steps which an increasing number of Irish farmers are taking.

I gcomhthéacs thodhchaí na tíre seo, tá tábhacht criticiúil ag baint leis an talmhaíocht a choinneáil beoga agus múnla na feirme teaghlaigh a chaomhnú. Tá sé seo den riachtanas más mian linn nach ndéanfar faillí in aon chuid dár gcríocha náisiúnta. Tá sé seo den riachtanas más mian linn Éire de phobail áitiúla bhisiúla a bheith againn. Agus tá sé seo den riachtanas más mian linn caidreamh beo saibhir a choinneáil lenár timpeallacht nádúrtha.

[Maintaining a vibrant agriculture and preserving the family farm model is of critical importance to the future of this country. It is a vital necessity if we want to ensure that no portion of our national territory is left neglected. It is a vital necessity if we want an Ireland of thriving local communities. And it is a vital necessity if we want to sustain a living and rich relationship with our natural environment.]

Finally, farming is important to our collective future because, as both nourishing work and a nurturing way of life, it connects us to one of the most fundamental of human activities. Our farmers are keeping alive the ‘endangered language’ of interconnections between people and nature, which carries within it the knowledge to ensure food security. Indeed we should never forget the very basic fact that agricultural produce reflects the soil in which plants are grown or on which animals graze, and that we, in turn, are a reflection of what we eat.

Autumn is an important season on Irish farms, a time when harvest nears completion, and when food and animal fodder is safely stored inside, enabling both men and their animals to face with serenity into the winter months ahead. Nature has an incredible ability to replenish itself, and this is especially evident this year, as our farmers have harvested the abundant crops yielded by a beautiful summer. I am aware that the dry weather conditions present a notable challenge to our contesting ploughmen, in particular to our loy diggers, but I trust that they will know how to handle the hard ground.

And as we are facing into the next year with a renewed sense of optimism, I share the hope of everyone here that the sod we are turning over will deliver a bountiful harvest.

Tá áthas orm a fhógairt go bhfuil tús leis an (83ú) Comórtas Náisiúnta Treabhdóireachta!

[I am delighted to declare the 83rd National Ploughing Championships open!]