Farmers should start a "new generation" of coops and sell more of their produce to local markets, a conference in Wexford has been told. Mr Richard Douthwaite, an economist and writer from Westport, Co Mayo, said farmer-owned co-ops were established with a high level of idealism, but now measured success solely in terms of profit and throughput.
There was nothing to stop farmers reinventing co-ops and starting the movement again as had happened in Denmark, he told the conference on "Sustainable Living in Rural Ireland", organised by County Wexford Partnership.
One delegate said the co-ops were "like a colossus bearing down on their creators". Mr Douthwaite, however, said farmers could make profits by avoiding the large co-ops' overheads.
Speaking to The Irish Times later, he said small producers felt EU regulations covering standards of production had made things very difficult, but there were ways around these. "You'll remember some years back when private buses had to form clubs to make themselves legal. Farmers could do something similar," he said.
"If you're a member of a club and you're only selling to other members of the club, then the public hygiene regulations do not apply."
Standards would be maintained, as farmers would be trading on their reputations. Mr Douthwaite also challenged the view that the numbers employed in farming would continue to fall in the future. Production was currently reliant on fossil energy, but the International Energy Agency expected world oil production to peak by 2006 to 2008.
The trend which had seen fossil energy replace human energy would be reversed and farms would become more labour-intensive. "The idea that there are going to be fewer people on the farms of the future is very probably mistaken."
The process which had seen farmers produce goods for remote markets had also gone too far, and the balance needed to be tilted back towards selling to local consumers, he said.
He described as "old hat" a recent economic analysis carried out by Peter Bacon and Associates which emphasised the need for Wexford to attract more inward investment. "This is the old way. Now we need to think how we can match the needs of the area with the resources of the area."
Representatives of community groups, State agencies and development bodies attended the two-day conference in Enniscorthy last week.