With 00-reg "four-by-fours" parked beside the latest hi-tech machinery in neat yards by spick-and-span milking parlours, have the days of the "poor farmer" disappeared? That's what Trinity college professor Alan Matthews set out to investigate in Farm Incomes, myths and reality, which looks at the various components which now go to make up the income coming into Irish farms.
Matthews says that today there is no generalised farm income problem. The entire income from farming comes from public subsidies from Irish and EU taxpayers and consumers. Since 1973, the bulk of income has come from the EU, in market-price support, premia payments, headage payments, payments under CAP accompanying measures and socio-structural aids. Net budget receipts from FEOGA, the EU's agricultural budget, amounted to £1.7 billion in 1997.
Do farmers pay enough tax? Matthews says the £75 million they paid in 1998 seems extraordinarily low in relation to the direct payments they receive. He estimates the burden of the Common Agricultural Policy on Irish taxpayers and consumers at £900 million, half the income from farming, and does not think this trend should continue. He also examines the different methodologies used to calculate farm income by various agencies - as confusing a study as the different end products they yield. Farm household income now exceeds average household income in the State, although almost half of farm households are benefiting from off-farm income.
But Matthews has an agenda: he believes it's time for Ireland to adopt a new strategy towards agricultural policy in the EU, and has used his figures to make this case comprehensively. This is a very detailed book and a valuable contribution to the debate on the future of agriculture both in Ireland and the EU generally. But figures are figures and can be used in different ways for the pros and cons of any argument.
It's not a book the IFA or the ICMSA would choose to leave lying around on casual tables in their foyers, but it's certainly a book they would need to keep closeted in their bookshelves.
Ella Shanahan is an Irish Times journalist