Cheques and balances in income

Like it or not, the words "farmer" and "subsidy" are now firmly twinned in the public's mind. As European farming has become more and more divorced from the natural economic laws of supply and demand, farm incomes tend to be dictated, not by productivity or price, but by direct payments from the EU. "Cheques in the post" from Brussels are now reckoned to account for some 50 per cent of average farm income.

It is a situation neither the country's 140,000 farmers nor the EU feel is desirable. Both would prefer to see farms support themselves without the need for market intervention. However, they believe the present distortions are necessary both to safeguard food supply and to staunch the flow of rural depopulation. The alternative, argue interventionists, is to see small farmers systematically replaced by giant US-style ranches and the countryside denuded of communities.

With strategic weaknesses such as these at its core, can the broader agribusiness sector, which extends from seed and grain merchants to food processors, offer much by way of employment opportunity for the future?

"Traditionally, when farmers do well everybody does well," says Jim Devlin of the IFA's Farm Business Committee, "because farmers typically reinvest everything back into the farm in the form of better plant, machinery or buildings." The corollary of this, however, is that shocks to farm incomes are equally widely felt.

"At present, the milk and sheep sectors are holding their own," he says. "Beef, however, which is the largest agribusiness sector and underpins everything, has been taking something of a battering since March 1996. Grain, too, is suffering with output prices falling steadily over the last two years. Pigs are also under pressure." The current buoyancy felt elsewhere in the economy isn't coinciding with the cycle which farmers are experiencing, he says, and at the wider agribusiness level this has been reflected in heavy rationalisation. "The coops will continue to be big employers for example," he says, "but there is always pressure on them to reduce costs."

There are, however, a myriad of ways in which to make a career in the broader agribusiness sector, he says, ranging from the farm inputs side such as chemicals or seeds, to the outputs side which includes food processing or marketing. There is also a raft of consultancy niches, from financial services to helping deal with compulsory purchase orders and environmental planning, in between.

The first port of call for many who wish to work in agribusiness is a degree in agricultural science. Seamus Sheehy, professor of agribusiness at UCD, sees his students take up a variety of jobs.

"While in the past the majority of them found their natural home in the public sector, either with the Department of Agriculture or in agencies like Teagasc, a major cutback on recruitment has stemmed this tide. Most graduates now move directly into the private sector instead. Many of our graduates start out as sales representatives hired by the bigger companies such as Avonmore/Waterford or the Kerry Group, for example," he says. "As the meat and beef companies move increasingly into quality assurance, this has meant opportunities here too for graduates." Many "ag" graduates, as they are universally known, are making money drawing up REPS (rural environment protection scheme) plans for farmers on a consultancy basis. The going rate per plan is about £200. With 25,000 farmers participating in the scheme and numbers growing all the time, this has proved to be a lucrative sideline for the entrepreneurial agricultural graduate. "It also provides a good way for young people to cut their teeth and get started," says Prof Sheehy.

While the beef industry has suffered a series of BSE-related setbacks, employment levels remain high, according to John Smith, chief executive of the Irish Meat Processors Association. At times of peak throughput, up to 9,000 are directly employed in the processing trade, excluding those employed in ancillary services such as transport and refrigeration.

"A record number of cattle are being slaughtered," he says, "mainly due to the absence of live cattle exports." Where the impact of BSE is being felt is in meat industry margins and the prices farmers are getting for their cattle. "Our projections for 1998 show employment levels to be on a par with this year," he says.

The added-value food processing sector, which ranges from pizza toppings to breakfast cereals, is also performing well, particularly at the start-up stage.

A spokesperson for Teagasc puts growth rates in the sector from 1993 to 1996 at 5 per cent per annum. While the prospects are good at entrepreneurial level, however, employment in the sector as a whole is a question of swings and roundabouts, he says, pointing out that large PLCs will always look to trim back jobs. Recent events at Avonmore/Waterford are a case in point. "If the food sector as a whole stands still next year it will be doing well," says John Smith.