International Year of the Woman Farmer: Motion
Seanad Éireann — 2026-05-20
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Nessa Cosgrove (LAB), Labour Panel

It is all right. I do not need extra time.
What I was saying was what everyone here had said, namely, that only 13% of total farm owners in Ireland are female. I know the Government has committed in the programme for Government to implement this report and is saying that the three multistructural changes would be policy overhauls, cultural validation and targeted innovation funding. This is where education comes in. For many years, I was a youth liaison worker in rural and urban schools. Agricultural science was always offered as a subject in the rural schools but often it was not offered in single-sex girls schools. This is about looking at the inclusion of agricultural science at junior certificate level and the diversification of farming to include what Senator Brady spoke about, namely, where our food comes from, growing, food security and initiatives like social farming. It involves looking at educational issues around that. I would love to see such a subject at junior certificate level. It could be a combination of home economics and agricultural science.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-05-20/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:58+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-05-20