Is there a future farming marginal land?

Suckler farming is in a good place right now. Beef prices have crossed the €7/kg mark.

Ten-month-old weanlings are hitting €1,600/head in the marts and there’s an air of positivity again in the sector.

Some even say that the decline we have seen in numbers over the last few years could be stalled by better margins on small suckler farms.

However, there are still huge issues to deal with, including succession – a problem that’s a lot bigger than many people think on the drystock side of the house.

My wife and I have four children and while it’s completely up to themselves to choose their career and pathway in life, I would love to see at least one of the children take up farming on a full-time or part-time basis.

Sitting around the kitchen table last weekend reading the Irish Farmers Journal front page story - ‘State push to rewet land’ – one of them asked: “Could that happen to our farm?”

We farm some marginal land in west Cavan and there was genuine concern across his face.

His younger brother asked: “Will our house be OK?” His little mind had a vision of a dam being built somewhere on the Shannon and all of west Cavan being under water within a few hours.

They were quickly put at ease and there was some laughter, but in the back of my mind I thought about what the future holds for part-time farming on marginal land in our part of the country.

Farming legacy

Instilling a love for agriculture in young people is a delicate business. It takes encouragement and also a belief that there is a future in what you’re doing and that you will be supported in doing it.

For many farming families, succession is also about creating a legacy and keeping the farm that you have farmed in existence for the next generation and generations to come. If you are on peat soil, that farming legacy is in doubt and those farming on peat soils could be forgiven for thinking that nobody has their back. That’s where the frustration lies.

Rewetting is a really divisive issue, and looking on from a small farm in the northwest I feel that farmers farming marginal land and drained peat land are being hung out on the back of meeting our 2030 climate change targets.

A report – titled ‘A colossal missed opportunity’ – was published this week by the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council and the Climate Change Advisory Council.

It states: “Rewetting 80,000ha of peatlands could deliver massive reductions in emissions at a low cost...An estimated outlay of €0.3 billion could save a cumulative total of 6.5 Mt CO2 equivalent of emissions by 2030 (Teagasc, 2023).”

It also recommends that the State purchase marginal/peat land to implement land conservation measures. I know we have to make progress, but singling out one sector on one land type surely isn’t right.

I’ve been accused of being paranoid in the past when I have highlighted the suite of back door measures that the powers that be are implementing to reduce stock numbers and ultimately farming in areas like the north west.

Reduced stocking rates

We’ll start with some of the softer ones. Reducing stocking rates due to nitrates restrictions has been perceived as a dairy problem but it filters back to being a big issue on drystock farms. On many smaller marginal farms, some good ground might be rented to take a cut of silage or graze cattle during the summer months.

Yes, the Government are paying you a princely sum for keeping the gate closed but what does that say to the next generation that wants to farm?

Dairy farmers are under pressure to get rented land and are in a better position to pay more for that land so the suckler farmer loses it. The intended or unintended consequence is fewer suckler cows. The environmental scheme ACRES – through restricted grazing measures and reduced fertiliser – also means fewer suckler cows on many farms.

Massive money has been thrown at organic farming to encourage farmers to diversify into an alternative production system with a lot less stock.

Many farmers in the west have switched, not because of the premium for their organic produce, but for the high financial supports and incentives offered to go organic.

Stepping stones to rewetting

Many of these farms are small drystock holdings with marginal land and I would argue that, for many, organic farming is a mere stepping stone to rewetting or forestry in the future. Soil fertility will decline, rushes will take over.

You will need permission for drain maintenance. If your neighbour decides to rewet their land and block their drains, there is a strong chance it will affect your land. Eventually farming as we currently know it will cease.

Farming is very difficult on marginal soils even with main drain maintenance every few years and intermittent shoring of land. Forestry

Forestry is another one of these back door measures. Large premiums act as the carrot. Nobody is forcing anybody to plant trees on their land but it might be a case of having to make ends meet on some farms in the future.

Come back to the young person sitting in the passenger seat driving along the road in spring time looking at cattle. You drive by a field that’s been too wet to do anything with for the last two years because you rose the water table.

Yes, the Government are paying you a princely sum for keeping the gate closed but what does that say to the next generation that wants to farm? To me, it says ‘get out of here as quick as you can’.

The suite of back door stock reduction measures has worked a treat and has been a master class in how to reduce stock numbers without telling anybody to reduce stock numbers.

When all the measures are taken together, it means less stock. The latest Animal and Identification Movement Database figures show the Irish suckler herd was reduced by a massive 50,730 cows in 2024 to 745,100 cows – down from just over 1m suckler cows in 2015, meaning we are on track to hit the Teagasc forecast of 600,000 cows by 2030. Another box ticked.

The most disappointing element of all that has taken place over recent weeks is that farmers, the very people who will be most impacted by these decisions, have been left out of the conversation.

That sends the strongest message of all to anybody farming peat soils: you are merely in the way when it comes to implementing Government policy. Somebody else will make the decisions. This process has already started. You will be told what to do and you will fall into line whether you like it or not.

What does the future hold? Fewer cows, fewer farmers and fewer young lads sitting in the passenger seats? I really hope not.