The dependence of farmers on the EU cheque in the post is likely to be increased after the next round of reform of the Common Agricultural Policy.
Direct payments to farmers currently stand at 48 per cent of farm income and are worth £940 million, the Minister for Agriculture, Mr Walsh, said last week.
But he warned that the reforms of Agenda 2000 would cost the Irish economy a total of £226 million, a figure which is now accepted by the industry.
The Minister said that the current proposals, which are aimed at cutting EU supports for beef by 30 per cent, milk by 15 per cent and which contain no measures for sheep, are being opposed by the Government.
The support cuts, he said, would reduce prices and increase the dependence on direct payments, which are at a record high. He said the level of direct payments had increased by 132 per cent since 1992.
Mr Walsh was speaking at a seminar arranged last week so that he could meet and hear the views of the various consultative committees he had established. The decision of the Cardiff summit to have the EU negotiations on the package concluded by next spring, he said, had made matters more urgent.
But the Department had not yet placed priorities on the sectors which needed to be defended in the face of the Commission proposals, he added.
Counter-proposals were being prepared for the negotiations, which would intensify as the Austrian presidency ran its course and the Germans took over from January next year.
The Government has already rejected the detailed proposals put forward by the Commission. These include a reduction in the level of milk supports, in beef and suckler cow premium rights, proposals to abolish beef intervention and changes in the "extensification" arrangements in the beef sector.
The Government has insisted that it should be recognised that agriculture is more important to Ireland than to other memberstates given that 10 per cent of our workforce was employed in the sector.
Central Statistics Office figures published in 1996 showed 301,000 people working either full- or part-time on Irish farms, doing the equivalent of 223,400 full-time jobs. Family workers account for 92 per cent of this employment.
The numbers involved in Irish farming have been in decline and the number of people whose main source of income is derived from farming and related activities has dropped from 237,100 in 1975 to 134,000 in 1997.
The farming population is falling in all developed countries, but as a result of this decline the average income per farm has actually increased by 33 per cent in real terms since 1975 in Ireland.
Ireland also has a structural problem on its farms because of the age of farm-holders. Only 12 per cent of Irish farmers in 1996 were under 35 while 22 per cent were over 65.