Traditional farming

Yes it is. Dairying is the only really truly profitable farming enterprise at present. Ireland has one large advantage, we can grow grass for a longer period of the year than most any other country maybe except NZ.

Yes we can get exceptional crops of grains but we have to use a lot of sprays to prevent fungus type disease's and after that harvesting and ripening can be hindered by the weather. This effect the value of the crop.

You would need vast acerage to make a living off beef or lamb. Chicken and pigs are now factory type operations and while farmers carry out both of these enterprise running smaller enterprise's based on these is limited to your access to a market. If you cannot sell the produce yourself ( the same with smaller scale veg production) and charge a premium price you are at nothing.

Most drystock farmers are part time with a smaller number of larger operators fulltime. However we are price takers in that we have absolutely no control of the price we get for our produce.

For instance in the last 8-10 weeks the price of beef has not increased. The difference between the price Irish and British farmers get for beef has open to an all time high. Usually it varies from 80-120 ( 20-40c/ kg) euro per head on cattle at present it is gone to over 250/ head. At the same time the price of white offal has doubled in price ( white offal is much more valuable off grazing cattle compared to feedlot cattle). In that time in an industry we are told is driven by market forces no operator has increased there price to try to grab market share.

Because of the limitations on profitability it would be economic suicide to diversify. The aim in part time farming to maximize your return per hour from a profitability point of view.

Yes you would but you would be killed from the work

30 cows a big herd 40 years ago.

I think it is possible but it wouldn’t be easy. Most of people are used to buy veg/meat that look and taste the same all year around. If you raise a non mass produced standard pork, I am sure some people would find the taste too “gamey”, the spring butter too yellow. Let alone an apple that is not round.

I would like to see more local farmers at market. It should be the majority of the stalls and not only 1 or 2 (at least to the ones I have been). i would also like to see more farmers selling their produce from their farm. It would change people’s perception of what real food is.

The benefit of traditional farming is that you don’t have all your eggs in the same basket but it also means you wouldn’t be an expert in all of them and that would impact productivity.

Thats so true - problem nowadays is that so many farmers have been brainwashed into that "race to the bottom" model and what big agri business presents to us, that knowledge of things like self sufficiency, diversity, mixed low input farming, maintaining health soil etc. have nearly been lost:(

The vet said to me one time the man with 40 cows minds them tighter than the man with 400.

Understandably so.

I am not a production at any cost advocate. However Ireland has always produced more food than we consume. It is not just in Ireland that production has jumped but right accross the world.

i saw a figure for World population. A century ago it was 1.7 billion. Today it is 7.5 billion with a projected 10 billion by 2100. This was mainly due to synthetic N. Without synthetic N it's estimated our population would be less than 50% of the present population. The difference in population would have been prevented by famines and there associated issues.

It's all very well to say you can take a step back however you are dependent on the whole world stepping back. Any of my posting us in agreement with the present direction of Cap with Criss Eco and convergence and directing funding away from production.

I saw an interesting figure I think it was if N use dropped from 250 to 200kgs /HA on intensive farms grass production would only drop about 10%.

Most production is driven often by technical support(Teagasc and agri consultants) where profit is not the driver but production.

On 24 HA I use 4.5 ton of Urea, 2 ton of Can and 4T of 18-6-13 to finish 60 cattle. I am at 138 k N/HA. I will probably move over to MSS on my grazing ground but will try to keep stock at present levels, just below derogation limits

A lad made a point to me today. We both taught you could have 30-40% rise in food price inflation at the farm gate. But this may be exacerbated within retail. If this happens what effects will this have on the food and drink services sector. You could see large reduction in things like coffee production and grains from countries in South America.

If this happens eating out could significantly decline and things like take away coffee could become s luxury rather than a staple. It might be back to the jar of Maxwell house for many

Was talking to someone once who tried to make a go of the self sufficiency life with a market of veg to sell to the public.

They gave it up fairly quickly. Not sure why completely but I got the impression they tried it to see could they do it and then moved to a different chapter of their life.

There seems to me in this country a brainwashing mantra atm of be self sufficient, do it all yourself, the public will buy from you and everything will be hunky dory. We never hear of those who tried it and it either didn't fit or it failed them and who've moved on.

Anyway that's all.

Would you be better off it you let/set the farm and got a job? Same thing really

Wasnt really the point I was making. A lot are quick to question the viability of someone doing something different but not many question whether their own business stands up to the same scrutiny.

Taking into account hours worked, capital invested and risk. Most farming businesses would not be particularly attractive propositions to the average person on the street.

It is unlikly that a person that cam fails run a standard farming business will manage to run a niche business where marketing and development skills are required.

As a Matt O'Callaghan a sport journalist said about a club that has got from Junior B football to senior in seven years and achieved senior hurling status last year ''the blueprint is there and looks easy but few can manage it''.

In a standard farm business where silage and slurry is contracted out it possible to run such a business in 10-15 hours a week for 40+ weeks/ year

It's very much a case of each to their own. If that woman mentioned with 4 cows is happy, more power to her. Probably gets quite a lot of satisfaction out of running that business