Talks aimed at ending an eight-week-old dispute between clerical officers and the Department of Agriculture are to begin today.
The dispute, which involves over 900 workers, relates to promotional opportunities for staff at the Department's 35 local offices.
A total of 250 members of the Civil Public and Services Union (CPSU) have been picketing offices in Tralee, Limerick, Galway, Castlebar and Clonakilty for the past six weeks after they were suspended for refusing to perform certain duties in pursuit of their claims.
A union spokesman told ireland.comthe talks were a "positive development" but there would be no "quick fix". To suggest the issue would be solved in one meeting was "optimistic", he said.
Up until now the Department has taken a hardline approach to the workers at the behest of the Department of Finance, he suggested.
The union claims the promotional opportunities for the clerical officers are not on par with the State's other 30,000 civil servants.
The farm organisations have been applying increasing pressure on the Minister for Agriculture and Food, Mr Walsh, to resolve the issue. The Irish Farmers' Association, which met the Minister last week, claims more than 1,100 herd owners of disease-restricted herds are badly hit by the dispute.
It claimed that because the handling of official documentation had been hit by the strike, farmers were unable to move animals in or out of their herds.