05 / NURSERY
Respected Nursery-man and industry commentator, Pat FitzGerald, sets out a 10 point strategy for protecting the future of commercial horticulture in Ireland
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hen the Editor asked me to contribute to the first issue of Horticulture Connected, my initial reaction was NO! There’s nothing left to say, it’s all been said before. Memories of meetings held 20 years ago came back, and I thought, what’s the point in repeating the same old stuff? Surely my energy is better spent on developing my own business. My first reaction – although shaped through my personal experience over the years – is also symptomatic of one of the fundamental issues which undermine our sector and set it apart from related and more well attended business sectors. Agriculture springs to mind. Perhaps against my better judgement, and in the interests of stimulating action rather than comment, I relented to editorial pressure. Below is a list of ten points which I feel should form the cornerstone for an Irish horticulture strategy. Given my area of expertise I have focused more on nursery production.
1. DONT REINvENT THE WHEEL The first action to be undertaken should be a comprehensive and industrywide review of the original Bord Glas Report produced in 1990. This report was extensive and in my opinion well thought out at its time. Much of it is
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still relevant in broad terms today. Re-examining the report will help to highlight a number of things. Much of what we should be doing has already been thought out, but not implemented; that many industry people invested heavily in the document and were never acknowledged, and the lack of implementation seriously undermined motivation for future participation. Collaboration between businesses was seriously undermined in the past and this needs addressing.
2. GET OUR FACTS STRAIGHT To my knowledge, there is no hard data on the value of Irish horticulture. The same old farm gate estimates are trotted out each year and this is seriously undermining the whole sector. We need a comprehensive assessment of the true value of the industry, encompassing actual sales, services, tourism, parks, gardens, attractions and all the indirect financial, social and health benefits derived from horticultural activity. Until this is completed, no policy maker or decision maker can be expected to look positively on the sector. To give you some insight on the poor data collation, I contacted the CEO of Tourism Ireland who was able to provide me clear, unambiguous figures. It’s starting to
HORTICULTURECONNECTED / www.horticulture.ie / February 2014
look like these figures are not being used for industry promotion.
3. COMMUNICATE WITH THE PEOPLE THAT MATTER The sector needs to work with organisations such as the IFA, Agri Aware and Bord Bia to develop a continual conversation with the consumer and public. We need to look at how best each of the sub-sectors can develop a unified or at least similar strategy, to deliver this objective. This needs an annual funding mechanism on a continuous basis. To this end I suggest the industry and the state agencies could benefit by linking up with the HTA in projects in the UK.
4. GROWING WITHOUT BORDERS We need to start working as an island economy, promoting cross border activities. We also need to foster a more collaborative relationship with the UK. And while there are obvious plusses and minuses to such collaboration, I suggest that overall the benefits in utilisation of various resources - if thought about in the full context of the EU - would be positive in the direction of the Irish industry.
5. A MODEL SERvICE As far back as the late 90s, it was clear
PHOTOGRAPH BY ADAM L
SINGULAR vISION
