A survey of public attitudes towards farming and food production, conducted last August by the Rural Development Unit of UCD, has produced reassuring messages for the agricultural sector and will help to underpin some of the key initiatives taken by the EU Commissioner for Health and Consumer Protection, Mr David Byrne.
Central to the findings is a desire by Irish consumers for a proper food labelling and tracability system, with four out of five people prepared to pay more if that would guarantee food safety. The five most important considerations in buying food were listed as: quality, price, health, taste and safety.
While the sampling points chosen for the survey, and the methodology used, might be viewed as favouring a "rural bias", the overall results in terms of consumer attitudes show a high level of satisfaction with food safety standards here.
At the same time, however, two-thirds of those surveyed identified the risk from genetically modified foods as a "major concern" while the figure fell to 42 per cent where the risk from BSE was concerned. Some 47 per cent said they had changed their eating patterns as a result of BSE, but beef was still the most commonly eaten meat. And a staggering 95 per cent said they ate meat products more than three times a week.
At a time when agriculture and food production is under scrutiny as never before, the results of this survey should reassure farmers and encourage young people to become involved in the industry. Changes in the Common Agriculture Policy (CAP), with greater emphasis being placed on stricter rules and controls will involve the introduction of costly checks such as animal tagging and tracability.
The need to monitor and regulate factory farming methods, which were the source of disease outbreaks in Britain and on the Continent, is also widely accepted at EU Commission level.
On the basis of this survey, there would appear to be considerable support in Ireland for a shift in financial resources from traditional market supports to rural development aid so as to reward farmers for the many services they provide to the community.