A campaign is underway in the Irish Republic to strengthen the horticulture sector and reduce the flood of imports, many of them from the UK.
The immediate aim is to encourage the establishment of several small commercial enterprises that will not only offer employment to many of those currently on the dole queue but will also meet some of the domestic market demand now being filled by produce from abroad.
As part of the initiative, special start-your-own-business courses, covering the different horticulture sectors, have been organised by the Irish farm research and advisory service Teagasc achieving an “overwhelming” response.
Teagasc horticulture programme manager Jim O’Mahony, said: “We have had to turn people away because we just couldn’t cope with the numbers who turned up. In the current Irish economic climate, some obviously see horticulture as offering the prospect of a sustainable livelihood, and of course it does.
“Over half the seed potatoes used in Ireland are imported, as are €4m worth of sweet potatoes, and both could be replaced by home-grown varieties. Similarly, 95 per cent of the apples consumed here are brought in from abroad, including the UK, and there is obviously scope there for Irish growers to displace much of these imports.”
The Teagasc courses, held in its horticultural colleges, cover the vegetable and potato sectors, fruit, mushrooms, cut foliage and floristry, as well as nursery stock sand protected crops.
But the objective doesn’t stop at replacing imports, according to O’Mahony. “We are also looking at the export markets in the UK and other countries in a bid to increase the cut foliage sector, for instance… The more we can strengthen and develop all sectors the greater the returns in terms of jobs and the economy. That’s why we are also appealing to consumers to show their support for Irish produce” he said.
This year one of the big Irish success stories has been the potato sector, with a bumper crop that resulted, for the first timne, in exports of over 50,000 tonnes to Russia.
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