I thought I was hearing things while tuned into an IFA webinar during the week when Eoin Lowry, head of agribusiness at Bank of Ireland, said: “We don’t want to become a dairy bank.”

To give context, Lowry was speaking on the importance of diversification within farming and how it’s good for banks to spread risk among the sector. With a solid dairy customer base, his words shouldn’t concern those at BOI HQ.

His words got me wondering though.

Are banks turning an eye towards climate linked lending to farms or was he heeding the Cuffe correspondence?

Perhaps being a grain man at heart he knows farming isn’t just a black and white issue.