AN INTERNATIONAL PANEL of experts in food policy is in discussion with Irish farmers seeking to examine whether a “land squeeze” is taking place around purchases in the sector.
The group was invited over by farmers who make up a recently formed group seeking to form a ‘land observatory’ out of concern that increasing tracts of land are being acquired across the country by billionaire buyers.
While the purchases are entirely legal, there are worries that they’re driving up the price of land.
A member of the IPES-Food group visited Ireland in October. IPES-Food group has previously previously examined parts of Europe, Africa and South America, looking at the use of land, the different ways it’s used for farming and how it’s acquired when put on the market.
Its Land Squeeze report published earlier this year raised concerns over a “huge wave” of purchases by wealthy buyers across those regions and called for a focus on community ownership schemes and equitable access to land.
Daniel Long, a 31-year-old farmer in Tipperary who is among those pushing for a land observatory, said it has the knock-on effect of making it unaffordable for others and limiting opportunities for smaller and often younger farmers to continue in the sector due to the lack of options to expand their business.
He told The Journal that farmers in the region have seen land become “unaffordable” due to the involvement of larger farming businesses.
Long said this was having a “detrimental effect” on creating opportunities for younger farmers.
The age profile of farmers is a key concern to the sector with almost one third of all farm holders aged 65 or over – compared to just above 20% more than 30 years ago.
Ines Tielas da Silva, a Portuguese research and project officer in sustainable food systems for IPES-Food, told The Journal that one of the core findings was how the “bigger players keep getting bigger”.
Long brought Tielas da Silva on a tour of parts of Munster to look at how “land concentration manifests on the ground” in Ireland.
The group has examined European countries such as Italy and Scotland, and may yet play a role in helping to facilitate a similar study for Ireland.
Tielas da Silva pointed to some reforms Ireland may be able to take heed of, including a measure in Scotland giving communities first right to land if it goes up for auction.
“It’s a way of centring smallholders and family farmers and giving them a future,” she said.
Another big factor in parts of the world is degradation, Tielas da Silva said, which is where land becomes harder to produce crops from due to the heavy use of chemicals or intensive farming methods.
According to the most recent data from farm research body Teagasc, 69% of land is purchased by dairy farmers. Around 20% of buyers were referred to as investor or hobby farming.
Dairy has long been the most profitable sector for farming, and the most expensive county for land in 2023 was Waterford, a dairy heartland. An acre of farmland in the county can fetch €20,000 according to the Teagasc report.
While the Food Group did not refer to any specific landowners, John Magnier’s largescale farming operation based in Tipperary was singled out recently at a protest in October.
Farmers and other groups demonstrated against the purchase of land by Magnier after he outbid a farmer who had previously been working the same land for some time.
As The Journal reported at the time, some farmers from the wider area have been critical due to concerns over the buying of land by investment groups and largescale farming operations.
That meeting heard that the average asking price for some of the country’s most fertile land has now reached €40,000 an acre.
Magnier’s Coolmore Stud is one of the country’s best known horse racing operations and the Magnier family also has tillage farms in Munster.
The family and Coolmore have no involvement in the dairy sector.
It declined to comment publicly when contacted but sources close to the company have contended that the thoroughbred industry is among the more labour intensive in farming, with the argument going that companies such as Coolmore have been important in mitigating and even reversing the impacts of rural depopulation.
They pointed to how Magnier’s lands directly employ over 1,300 staff whose families live and work in the region supporting a sustainable local economy.
The Magniers’ property holdings include several hundred individual homes used to provide accommodation for hundreds employed by Coolmore in Tipperary and Cork.
In terms of future plans for Coolmore, sources also point to there being currently three generations of the Magnier family actively involved in farming, with several grandchildren having completed green certs to continue the family involvement.
Long, the Tipperary farmer was among those that spoke at that protest in Clonmel last October.
Greater concentration of land – known as ‘consolidation’ in the sector – is also viewed by Long as a possible danger to the “social fabric” of rural Ireland.
But Long said that as part of any research, he believes Ireland needs to get to grips with defining what a ‘family farm’ means.
“It’s a very umbrella term that is taking in largescale operations that are a far cry from family farms,” Long said.
“It’s a very difficult conversation to have and not an easy pill to swallow because we advertise our produce based on the idea that it’s a family farm model here.”
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