Minister for Agriculture Charlie McConalogue is “very much considering” a farm retirement scheme.

“We’re one of the best food-producing countries in the world, we’ve great capacity to be really strong into the future, but all of that is dependent on new young people coming through and driving and taking Irish agriculture forward.

“We’re operating in an environment where there’s full employment in terms of the economy and I know when I was growing up it was farming seven days…and the 40-hour week wasn’t something we’d have known.

“Now young farmers are coming through and they are educated, there’s options there and we have to make sure that farming is attractive in terms of an income point of view to reward people’s time and effort, whether they are part-time or they’re full-time,” he told the Irish Farmers Journal at Ploughing 2024.

Attractive

He said that the lifestyle of farming has to be attractive for young people.

“That’s why I’m establishing a commission on generational renewal and as we look towards the next CAP, we have to have generational renewal very much at the core of how we do that,” he said.

He said that young farmers need to be at the centre of the CAP.

“Considering the place for a retirement scheme and a renewal scheme is something that very much needs to be a part of that conversation.

“There’s 30% of farmers over 65 at the moment that are already at retirement age. The last early retirement scheme we did in this country was encouraging farmers between the age of 55 and 65 to retire early.

“But yet we’ve about 30% of farmers already at retirement age and able to avail of a pension. As big a focus needs to be on how we attract young people in.

“Whatever way we structure it and whatever way we put the funding in, the result has to be young people coming in that want to drive forward and be the future of agriculture,” he said.