CAP reform protest planned for next Friday

THE Rural Ireland Organisation (RIO), formerly Ireland's Future, in conjunction with Extinction Rebellion, is holding a protest outside the Department of Agriculture offices in Kildare Street next Friday, June 25, at 1 p.m. Other like-minded organisations have been invited to attend.

The protest is being held to support reforms to the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP).

Leader of the RIO, Mayo man Gerry Loftus, said the approach pursued by government and the main farming organisations in fighting for a CAP that allows the current unjust system to remain unchanged will not be tolerated.

Since the introduction of direct support Pillar One payments in 2004, small family farmers have watched 80% of the money go to 20% of the farmers, financing some farmers to become intensive commercial farmers while leaving 56,000 farmers on payments so small they had to get an off-farm job to support their farms and families.

Mr. Loftus said these small farmers are the most productive farmers in the country if you factor in the ecosystems services their farming practices provide while they rear extensively grazed beef and lamb - for example: carbon sequestration; clean, unpolluted water; and biodiversity friendly diverse habitats. They also provide a farmer friendly service to the tourism industry which is worth billions to the exchequer and the Irish economy.

This, he said, can no longer be allowed to go unrecognised by our government who favours the flawed corporate/agribusiness-led model of Irish agriculture which is leading to a collapse of the Irish family farm model and the environment.

In persisting with this business model, more and more high nature value land will be abandoned, and the current climate and biodiversity crisis will worsen, he warned.

The intention of the RIO is to get more like-minded organisations involved in supporting the family farm model, as well as making taxpayers who fund the flawed agribusiness system aware of how their public money is spent.

Concluding, Mr. Loftus said it is RIO's intention to see the emergence of a people's movement to save rural Ireland.