A promise to bring Irishwomen involved in agriculture "out of the shadows" by enhancing their rights, particularly under the social welfare code, has been made by the Minister for Agriculture, Mr Walsh.
He announced what amounted to a personal crusade yesterday at the National Ploughing Championships in response to publication of a report of the Advisory Committee on the Role of Women in Agriculture.
For far too long women in farming had not been recognised either by economists or in the social welfare code, he said. "Economists make no allowances whatsoever in the definition of the work input by women on the farm, so their contribution is invisible."
In the social welfare code, women in agriculture fared even worse and had difficulty in making RSI contributions, he said.
"The downside of this is that women find that they are not entitled as of right to their widows' or old age pensions. "Women are described in derogatory terms in social welfare scripts as being `adult dependants'. This has to end," he said.
The Minister said he was setting up a working party to implement the main social welfare re commendations in the report and did not expect there would be any opposition to them. "We are not too far away from a time when women had no rights at all and were forced out of farms because they had no legal rights to them when their husbands died."
If women were to make RSI payments, Mr Walsh said, this would establish their right as a self-employed contributor to social insurance benefits such as maternity benefit, old age (contributory) pensions and widows' and orphans' contributory pensions.
He said the RSI contribution involved was not a great deal of money, about £216 per annum, and he wanted to see the right to pay the contribution established as quickly as possible, preferably in December's Budget. Mr Walsh said implementation of the main recommendations were "very important to me personally". The report was compiled under chairwoman Ms Ann McGuinness, Westmeath county manager.
The recommendations cover a wide range of issues, including access to education, training and information technology for the estimated 40,000 women working full-time in agriculture.
It also recommended increased representation in farm and other organisations, better access to transport and that a working group be established to develop a plan to give women farmers financial recognition for their input which is appropriate to present structures.