The 69th Annual General Meeting (AGM) of the Irish Farmers Association will take place next Tuesday 9 January in the Irish Farm Centre.

Francie Gorman from Laois will deliver his inaugural speech, as he becomes the 17th president of the IFA. He will succeed Tim Cullinan.

Taoiseach Leo Varadkar will be the guest of honour at the AGM dinner, and the Minister for Agriculture Charlie McConalogue will also address the meeting.

Francie Gorman said it was an honour and a privilege to be elected to lead farmers and he pledged to meet the significant challenges ahead.

“I want to unify farmers so that the collective voice can have an impact on decisions, whether they are made here or in Brussels. The debate on climate action has portrayed farming in a negative light and we have to change that,” he said.

Alice Doyle from Wexford is the new deputy president. It’s the first time in the history of IFA that a woman has been elected to the role of deputy president.

Three new regional chairs will join the new National Officers’ Committe, succeeding Harold Kingston, Francie Gorman and Pat Murphy.

Conor O’Leary takes over as Munster regional chair.

The outgoing environment chair, Paul O’Brien, is the new South Leinster regional chair.

Brendan Golden, who has served his term as livestock chair, will become Connacht regional chair.

The election for National Treasurer will take place at the AGM. Four candidates are in the running. They are Patrick McCormick, Rose Mary McDonagh, Pat O’Keeffe and Nigel Sweetnam.

The turnout for the election was just shy of 30,000 – a significant uplift on 2019.

For the first time, members received their ballot in the post and they had the option to bring their completed vote to their branch AGM, or return it by post.