Farmers for Action (FFA) is calling on Northern Ireland’s Minister for Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs, Andrew Muir to resign with immediate effect.
FFA spokesperson William Taylor commented: “We need an agriculture minister who understands farming. And we don’t have that at the moment.
“Minister Muir has consistently failed to reflect the needs of farming families across Northern Ireland in the policies that he has followed since taking office almost two years ago.”
This follows a ‘vote of no confidence’ in the minister that was unanimously endorsed by an executive committee meeting of the Ulster Farmers’ Union earlier this week.
Under the rules that govern the current operation of the Stormont Assembly and Executive, only the leader of the Alliance Party, Naomi Long, can move Minister Muir from his present position.
This is assuming the minister does not take the decision to resign himself.
There is no scope for the members of the Northern Ireland Assembly to vote a sitting Executive Minister out of office.
FFA
Meanwhile, FFA is questioning the impact that Northern Ireland’s Climate Change Act, passed in 2022, will have on production agricultural practices into the future.
Taylor said: “Currently increases in UK food prices are 100% down to the current government’s budgets and policies in tandem with corporate food retailers, corporate food wholesalers, and corporate food processors profit-taking – not farm gate price increases.
“In the meantime, farmers are receiving the same price for grains and oilseeds as was the case 40 years ago.
“The ex-farm milk prices is the same as it was back in 1987. And the same principle holds, where potatoes are concerned.”
According to the FFA spokesperson, this is “a direct result of boom and bust policies at government level”.
“The way forward requires farmers receiving prices that fully reflect their costs of production, generating a sustainable margin while also allowing for future business investment plans,” he said.
The FFA representative points to countries around the world, most recently Jamaica, that are now are now suffering the effects of accelerated climate change.
“The UK is included in the list of affected countries. All of this is costing lives and reducing food production,” Taylor said.
“It is time for change on a global scale beginning in the UK, right here, right now, for the sake of your children and their children.
“Farmers for Action wants want answers and change with immediate effect on food and fuel, whereby farmers across the UK and the world can produce these necessities if they are properly paid.”
