You don’t hear other professionals like doctors or journalists referred to as women doctors or women journalists, so why can’t women who farm simply be known as farmers?” asks Professor Maura Farrell, as she discusses the findings of a new report on women-led agricultural and rural innovation in Ireland.

The Female Led Innovation in Agriculture and Rural Areas (FLIARA) report on Ireland’s Policy Briefings, which stems from the hugely successful Horizon Europe FLIARA project led by Prof Farrell over the past two years, was launched in the University of Galway in recent weeks.

Authored by Prof Farrell, along with her University of Galway School of Geography colleagues Dr Aisling Murtagh and Louise Weir, Longford Women’s Link CEO Tara Farrell and Teagasc senior research economist Anne Kinsella, the report identifies nine policy priorities to support women-led innovation in Irish farming and rural areas, including access to finance, developing skills, digitalisation, gender inclusion and the CAP.

Speaking with Irish Country Living from Brussels, where she was attending a European Agricultural conference, Prof Farrell says while advances have been made in Ireland when it comes to supporting women in farming, a lot more remains to be done.

“This report is based on interviews with 30 women, 20 of whom are farmers and 10 others involved in rural innovation.

“One of the biggest issues we encountered was the identity crisis women farmers have, and the identity others associate them with, in the agricultural space,” she says.

“Women are wives, mothers, daughters. They have 10 other jobs to do alongside farming, but the patriarchal notions that still surround farming means that many of them rarely are recognised, or even recognise themselves as farmers.

“Entrepreneurs and farmers are generally perceived to be male, yet the generation coming through of young women farmers, who are showcasing their lives on social media, where being out on the tractor or in the milking parlour are part and parcel of their daily lives, are helping to change this perception.”

Equality and change

Prof Farrell says that while the recognition offered this year through the International Year of the Woman Farmer (IYWF) has been amazing, she says the progress made “can’t go to waste”.

“Everyone has got behind the International Year of the Woman Farmer and to have someone of the calibre of Carina Roseingrave as the Department of Agriculture’s ambassador has been a huge asset, but we need to see policy follow these wonderful sentiments in order to deliver equality and change,” she adds.

“We’ve never had a better platform, but we have to build upon it. We don’t want to leave the year behind with any platitudes of ‘the lovely women, weren’t they great?’. These women are serious operators who need proper supports to get to the next level, or to simply thrive at where they are at. It is frustrating at times that we aren’t driving more policy change, as we need a more consistent approach from the Department of Agriculture. Our role as researchers is to document what these women are saying. We thematically look at their thoughts and insights and we bring it forward. But we need consistent support for this research, because anything piecemeal will not serve women in farming and agriculture.”

Prof Farrell says the focus of the Ireland’s Policy Briefing report, which is based on the testimony of 30 successful farmers and rural entrepreneurs, was strategic – as she and her team wanted to show what can and is being done by Irish women with limited support.

“We want to change the narrative around women in farming and that is why we intentionally did not seek out women who were starting out in their agriculture or rural business journey,” she adds.

“We wanted to get away from the ‘poor women’ mentality, so we interviewed some of the most successful women in Irish farming, to show what they have already achieved in the absence of support, to demonstrate how far these people would go if they had the same supports as their male counterparts.”

Prof Farrell says women in farming and agriculture have never had a better platform, and much of that is down to the work done over the past decade by the 27 member European Commission’s Women in Agriculture Committee, who she says are doing ‘unbelievable work’ across Europe.

“We’ve spent the last 10 years trying to get a stream of gender funding for rural and agriculture and we have a phenomenal group of women at EU level driving this,” she says.

“By taking a gender budgeting approach to this, in effect making funding gender neutral, you can see how much funding is going to women in farming across the EU and it’s this visibility we need if we’re ever to reach a stage of equality.”

Among the recommendations of the report include a digital policy pathway, which Maura says is becoming increasingly essential for women farmers in the age of AI.

“The women we interviewed told us that they could do so much more if they had more time. While a lot of that goes back to the caring responsibilities of women, which feeds into a wider issue of rural policies around childcare, we also need to train women in AI, as it applies to farming business models. If they can get subsidy applications and accounts done quicker, then that is freeing up time for other farm work.

“Ireland is heading in the right direction, we’re one of only two EU nations along with Spain to have strengthened the place of women within CAP in recent years.

“While we have had many successful standalone ideas in this country, these haven’t been embedded in CAP and until that happens, we won’t see improvements for women in farming here.”

Prof Farrell says she hopes support for women isn’t one of the casualties of expected funding cuts in next year’s CAP, with the European Commissioner for Agriculture Christophe Hansen warning Irish farmers in recent weeks that almost €100bn is likely to be cut.

“The general feeling is that one of three areas of Irish farming will miss out under the next CAP and these seem to have been identified as subsidies, generational renewal and women. I sincerely hope it’s not women who take the hit, because if it is then this CAP won’t be supporting farming or rural entrepreneurs,” she explains.

“I honestly believe we are missing a trick in Irish farming and agriculture in general, if women are not involved in the conversations and policies from the start.

“It comes down to equality and choice and if you want women to go into rural diversification and farming, then you have to give them the choice of what level they want to aspire to.

“Supports shouldn’t be based on the need to scale up, there are a great many successful farms and rural enterprises out there that don’t need to scale up, and giving women the choice would be far better than restricting them.”

At our Women & Agriculture conference, Professor Maura Farrell will sit on a panel celebrating the International Year of the Woman Farmer.

Chaired by Amy Forde, news editor of the Irish Farmers Journal, the panel will also feature Alice Doyle, deputy president of the IFA, and Carina Roseingrave, Irish ambassador for the International Year of the Woman Farmer. For more details on the conference scan the QR below with your phone.