Generational renewal is the elephant in the room, according to Irish Farmers' Association (IFA) deputy president Alice Doyle.

Speaking on Wednesday morning at the Irish Farmers Journal breakfast briefing at Ploughing 2024, Doyle said that the aging profile of farmers is extremely worrying.

"We have to have people coming into farming. It's extremely worrying that we have an aging profile who are not able to continue and yet have nobody to hand it [the farm] over to.

"The farm wage is 43% of the average living wage - that is worrying when you have all these alternatives for young people to go into and yet agriculture can be one of the best places to be - we can see that.

"But, it's all going to depend on whether they can have an income. Young people will walk away if they don't have an income," she said.

'Optimistic'

Meanwhile, despite the current challenges facing agriculture, director of Teagasc Frank O'Meara has said that "you'd have to be optimistic for Irish agriculture".

"There's a protein deficit around the world. In the EU, you hear about limiting protein intake, but you don't hear in the rest of the world - there's a huge demand.

"In Ireland, we can never forget that we have some very good fundamentals. The grass-based system is a very sustainable system, it is a very low-carbon footprint system," he said.