Former president of Ireland, Mary Robinson, has warned that there are “big farmers who have to address policy issues – and with whom the Government has to address policy issues”.
In an address to the Seanad this week the former president stressed that there are “different farmers” but it is the big farmers that “have to change more”.
“I keep hearing that farmers feel the obligation and the burden, as opposed to that they are part of the solution and have to be moved with as part of the solution,” she added.
The former president, who is chair of The Elders – which is a group of global leaders who work for “peace, justice, human rights and a sustainable planet” – said she was “speaking from the heart” when she addressed the Seanad earlier this week and detailed how “the world is heating to a degree that it has never done before”.
She told the Seanad that the world was “at very big risk” and had “no more than six years to radically change course”.
Farmers
The former president heard directly from senators who highlighted the “greening” of agricultural policy across Europe, and why Irish farmers are “not convinced of the benefits”.
Senator Victor Boyhan said: “Over 50% of our farm families have to go off farm to supplement their income. That is linked to just transition because it is not just by choice.
“Our farmers, foresters, growers, fishers and food producers want a clear pathway by this Government and by the European Union as to how they will be supported by just transition, which in turn feeds into climate justice, tackling the environmental challenges around us”.
He asked Mary Robinson to bring back to The Elders and all her contacts in Ireland, Europe and globally “the message that we need to refocus on sustainable and viable rural communities which are dying in this country”.
“We need to include the farming activities that contribute to sustainability,” Senator Boyhan said.
Senator Róisín Garvey also told the former Irish president that the small farmer “is not causing any of the problems” while Senator Alice-Mary Higgins said Ireland “must use every instrument” that it has in relation to climate challenges.
Mary Robinson told the Seanad that “just transition” is absolutely vital particularly in relation to the “kind of regeneration of our soil, our land and encouraging farmers”.
“I very much agree with that phrase sustainable and viable rural communities,” she added.