July 20, 2003
On stoney ground
Yesterday's Irish Times Review interviewed Brendan Dunford, whose book, Farming and the Burren, analyses the impact of farming on the environment of the Burren.
"Farmers are often seen as environmental villians , but in the case of the Burren, the opposite is the truth. Without a continuation of the traditional methods of farming, which has sustained the community for 6,000 years, the Burren is in trouble", he says.
"Many people come here and see the wonderful views and look at the monuments and the plants, but they never seem to think of the people. If I want to change anything, that is what I want to do".
It is a worthy aim. Farming in the Burren probably hasn't changed much in centuries - the land is unsuited to intensive tillage farming, so it is normally used for grazing animals. Here, there is a problem. The balance of the Burren is maintained by letting the animals graze I the spring (where they remove the larger plants, like hazel) and then removing them in the summer, which means that smaller, fragile plants prosper. Because of the reduction in the number of farmers, and the need for the remaining farmers to maximise profitability, cattle are either not put on the Burren lands at all (being fed silage in sheds instead) or are left out all year (which means that the cattle eat everything).
It's not going to get better. Changes to EU agricultural policy (including reductions in price supports and subsidies) will mean either even less farmers or more intensive methods. The REPS scheme was supposed to address this sort of issue (across Europe) where traditional farm husbandry was rewarded (i.e. maintaining hedgerows, etc.). It has not been a success.
There is a more successful example in the Shannon Callows, which is the floodplain of the Shannon that extends from Athlone through Banagher down to Portumna. One of the habitats of the corncrake (which is nearly extinct in Ireland) is in the Callows. Traditionally in the Callows, farmers would cut hay late in the year, because the land (which is underwater in the winter) would take longer to recover, and it took longer for the meadows to mature. As it happened, this is exactly what was required for the corncrakes - the meadows were standing long enough for them to rear their chicks. With modern farming, the meadows were cut earlier, usually for silage that is less dependent on the weather. Alas, this was bad news for the birds. A corncrake will not abandon its young, and would not flee the cutting machines. (A corncrake will not cross open ground, so the custom of mowing a field from the outside in towards the centre proved devastating too compared to the older tradition of cutting across a field with a scythe). The government have introduced a scheme where farmers are subsidised to cut their hay or silage later in the year (in late July or August) as well as observe certain practices (i.e. mow the field from the centre outwards).It has proved successful in reducing the decline of the corncrake (whether they survive as a species is another story). Interestingly, an article in the Guardian asks if it is worth the bother saving an endangered species or even reintroducing an already-extinct species.
In all the debates about the future of farming, and the need for 'competitiveness', it is rarely considered how the countryside would be impacted. It is even more pertinent in 'poor' parts of Ireland, such as the Burren, The patchwork quilt of small, emerald-green fields, bordered by the stone walls so beloved of tourists, were not built in pursuit of aestheticism. They were built because economic necessity required farmers to create fields from land better suited for rock gardens.
If farmers in Ireland were truly pursue a free market approach, there would be a couple of hundred at most, and the hedgerows, trees and other 'obstacles' would be cleared, leaving vast, featureless and soulless tracts of land. Yes, they would be profitable, probably even without any subsidy, but I doubt if you would find many tourists willing to visit them. Of course, in such an environment, you wouldn't need all those nasty villages and country parishes cluttering up the land either. Roll them up into the nearest big town or city and think of how more efficient it would be. Then, all we'd have to do is paint the postboxes red, ban Irish, and pretend that the last 80 years never happened. Progress indeed.
Posted by Monasette at July 20, 2003 03:30 PM | TrackBack