Imagine the fanfare if it was announced that 6,000 jobs were required in a sector of the economy other than agriculture.

That’s a thought that passed through my mind on hearing the news of the need for many jobs over the next decade in dairy farming.

The jobs may have been easier filled in an economic downturn but as construction is on the rise again, the game has changed. The idea of getting drystock farmers to fill the labour gap has been floated but a significant proportion of these are already in off-farm employment.

At times, as drystock farmers, we get belittled by an element within the dairy sector.

If you know from the outset that you’re seen as second class then you’re not going to be in a rush to work for those who view you as such, are you? It wouldn’t surprise me to see compulsory placement on a dairy farm as a measure in a future drystock knowledge transfer programme to try to fill the gap.

Circumstances are placing extra pressures on farmers across all sectors.

You have to run faster to stand still. A lack of labour will lead to extra pressure on family farms that are already dangerous places. Farms that through the decades could support a few households can no longer do so and the financial unsustainability of many agricultural units creates extra pressure. Across the country, off-farm employment is a necessity on many drystock and even dairy units. If you have a mortgage or family in education you have little choice but to try and find work off farm. This leads to less time available on the farm and this in turn can cause its own troubles. The key is to find a system that puts you in charge of the farm rather than the farm in charge of you. This applies across all sectors within farming.

It means working smarter rather than harder and basing decisions on your most limiting resource which, on many farms across all systems, is time.

Sometimes you just have to prioritise jobs and this can cause friction between generations on family farms as an older generation does not understand why the farm does not come first all the time. Often, there isn’t time for general maintenance or repairs. This can in turn lead to slowing down work time at best and become safety hazards at worst.

On this farm contractors are used where possible; this allows the focus to remain on grass and stock. That’s probably a legacy of how my father started the business. Coming from a landless base owning machinery wasn’t an option when trying to get started. Currently, the only PTO in the place is on the fertiliser spreader and aside from the tractor and loader, a roller is the only other piece of machinery in the place.

Managing is a skill in itself and managing yourself is one of the hardest skills to learn. That is a lesson which will continue to be learned the hard way on farms across Ireland for the foreseeable future.

Labour will always be an issue in farming, the principles of which haven’t changed much over time but the experiences of those who farm have. Physical work appeals less and less with each generation. Increases in technology and exposure to it at a younger age means physical work won’t appeal to a generation that is more concerned with the Wi-Fi password rather than passing a ball around.