At the start of each new year, we should take a quick look over our shoulder at what has been achieved over the last 12 months.

What’s more important than looking back at what has gone before is to look forward to the year ahead. Given the last two years and all that we have gone through, it is more important than ever that we look ahead.

Having said that, I want to point to one of our highlights from 2022, that was the launch of our rebrand at the National Ploughing Championships.

The most important element of the launch was not the new logo, it was the phrase “Your club, your people”. This phrase tells us all what is at the centre of Macra and who we represent. We are about people. We represent young people who live in rural Ireland.

It is our intention to continue representing our people through the many avenues open to us. We will lobby hard on your behalf to ensure that your voice is not silent nor ignored. We will continue to deliver social outlets for our members, we will continue to work with individuals in their personal and professional development.

Resilience

Most of all, we will be there regardless of what 2023 brings. We have, after all, come through the last two years. I am not going to tempt fate here; rather, I will say that we as a collective have learned 20 years of resilience in the space of two short years.

We have learned to adapt to the unthinkable isolation that resulted from the lockdown. Not only did we adapt, we thrived and grew and we looked after each other in ways that we did not think possible.

For 2023, we will take the lessons that have been hard won. We will not revert back to the way things were, those days are well gone. We are on a path to the best of both worlds. We have the compassion that was so evident during the isolation combined with the much awaited social re-awakening of this country.

I am greatly looking forward to 2023, not because of what has gone before but because of what is to come, Macra is an institution that is not afraid to make waves and change to meet the needs of its members and society as a whole. Let 2023 be a year for us all to work even closer together.