The Government must make up its mind on whether it wants to preserve family farms or end up with “hobby farmers at one end and factory-farm units at the other with nothing worth mentioning in between,” ICMSA president Pat McCormack has warned.

He suggested that Government policy is driving such a potential change in agriculture, which he described as being a “social, demographic and economic disaster.”

“That means taking a conscious decision to make farming part of the [climate] solution and stop treating it as the cause,” McCormack said.

In his AGM address, McCormack suggested that farmers are being told they are the “problem” rather than an “economic and social asset to our country.”

He highlighted “environmental activist” commentary, the “antagonism” of excluding dairy farmers from the Fodder Support Scheme and nitrates banding as examples of not working with farmers.

“The ICMSA will be part of solutions that start from and proceed within the bounds of science and logic,” McCormack said.