If the EU Commission decides to increase quotas on a once-off basis in 2008, then new entrants and young farmers should be targeted, according to Catherine Buckley, Macra na Feirme’s national President. Ms Buckley said that a small once-off increase in EU milk quota would leave Irish farmers worse off over the longer term relative to getting no increase in quota as outlined in the FAPRI Ireland Partnership analysis of quota expansion. The leader of the young farmers’ organisation pointed out that an insignificant increase in quota for all dairy farmers across the board would not benefit the industry. ‘Instead, if we are to attract young people into the industry, we need to provide young farmers with milk quota access. We have a poor age profile with only eight percent of our farmers under the age of 35,’ she said. Ms Buckley said additional quota targeted at new entrants and young farmers would be purely ‘a license to produce’, rather than an asset, and the quota should be allocated nationally and completely separately from the milk quota exchange. ‘The targeting of increased quota to new and recent entrants is vital in order to allow those farmers who are the future of the dairy industry to rapidly expand their businesses in the years ahead and to prepare for an environment without milk quotas,’ she said. ‘Dairy farming is a very labour-intensive and tying occupation and young people must see the prospect of proper rewards for their time if they are to commit themselves to the sector,’ she concluded.
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