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DEAR SIR
In the wake of the election of Kamala Harris as vice-president in the US, it’s time to let the women of Ireland lead in our most important indigenous industry – agriculture.
I followed the count all week and viewed the president’s and vice-president’s inaugural speeches. While the speeches were wonderful, their stage presence in the aftermath gave a message to the entire world. Kamala Harris is now a national icon for all women across the world. Kamala’s mother, as a woman of colour, was only granted a right to vote in a US election 55 years back approximately.
So now it’s well overdue that the women in agriculture step out from behind the shadows of the powerful men in dark suits both in politics and farm organisations who have allowed the collapse of the family farm, particularly the beef sector, which is culminating in the exodus from a way of life that was the heartbeat of rural Ireland. It was the women of Ireland for at least the last century that maintained the family farm model, through their innovation in developing small enterprises within the farm gate with poultry, pigs etc. So I call on the leaders of all farm organisations to immediately draft a process that will deliver the orderly transfer of leadership to the farming women of Ireland, particularly the young, trained farmers.
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